OK, last time we worked with missions, we started the first of a short series that falls really out of Jonah. When we finish this, we'll return to the book of the twelve, those twelve minor prophets of the Old Testament. But this is a fallout of Jonah. Jonah is really a unique book in the Old Testament. It's a very strange book because the missionary methodology is really out of kilter with the rest of Old Testament Israel. Most of the Old Testament uses the come to method, come to Israel. The nations were to come to her. But Jonah is told to go out. He's to go out to the nation of Syria. And you don't find that in any other prophet of the Old Testament. And we don't know the full explanation for this. As best I can tell, one of the principles to learn from this is universal intent. God has a universal intent and that we're to stop reading the Old Testament so nationalistically, you know, Israel. Yes, it is a national document. But don't forget that there's a universal intent involved with that nation. So Jonah's problem was just that he thought too nationalistically. He was only concerned with his own nation, the nation Israel. He could care less about the Ninevites. That was obvious from what we studied. So Jonah's getting a wake up call to the effect that God has a universal intent toward all the nations, and it's a lesson for us to to stop thinking so narrowly. You know, we can become nationalistic as Americans to the point of bigotry. And when we've come to the to the point where we're unwilling to take the gospel to other people, groups, other cultures, other languages, you know, then we've become arrogant. And we've not understood grace. So we've crossed the line. And obviously Jonah is teaching us that at that point when we're there our hearts are contrary to the heart of God. So God has a heart for all the nations even in the Old Testament when he was dealing particularly with the nation Israel. So at least in one Old Testament prophet, the prophet Jonah, God uses the go out method. And that leads to a third possible point related to this, this strange book, and that is the question of is Jonah preparatory for the New Testament method of missions? Could it be preparatory for that? It could be laying the groundwork for the New Testament methodology, which is the go out method that Jonah used, such that when Stephen in Acts 7, Philip in Acts 8, Paul in Acts 9, 10, 11, 12 and following. Those who received the Great Commission in Acts, they could look back and they could say, you know, this isn't so new what God's doing. He's done this before. He's done this with Jonah. And further, look at the response Jonah got. I mean, male alive. All of Nineveh believed in God. And so those are some of my suggestions for why you have this strange little book of Jonah. I'm not saying I have all this knocked out. I just we just want to ask the questions, because if you don't ask the questions, you don't get the answers. So last time we started missions, we started with the definition. So let's review our definition. This is a doctrine that's not taught often in churches or seminaries. For that matter, missions has been left to specialized institutions outside of seminary. There's nothing wrong with specializing. But the problem is that seminaries are the place where pastors are trained and then pastors are the ones that are sent to their congregations to teach and to train on that level. And the problem is, is that if the pastors didn't get it in the seminaries, then most likely the people in the churches aren't going to get it either. And so every church, you know, despite all that, despite that there's a great ignorance in churches about missions. Every church has involved just about in some kind of missions, aren't they? And the problem is they don't know what it is, and it's often done very sloppily. OK, so we ought to know what missions is all about, and we defined it this way as descending out of a trained personal being. Sent out by a governing authority to proclaim the message of judgment salvation. We said also the sending out part has to be sort of suspended when dealing with the nation Israel, because that's the come to Israel method. But generally speaking, it's the sending out of a trained personal being. And notice we don't say a personal man. I'm not saying that I'm not a personal human being, because you also have angelic beings involved in missions in the tribulation. So we want to account for them as well. But in either case, we have to qualify. personal being with the adjective trained. They have to be trained. This is a crucial part of missions because you send someone out there who's not trained and all you're going to do is hurt people. OK. It's OK to send people out in a mission field to help people build a house, you know, or a doctor to bring medicine and so forth. But technically that that's not mission work. OK. And we're very confused about this. The church is very confused about this. The missionary is the person who's sent by governing authority to proclaim a specific message. OK, and that message is the message of judgment, salvation. I hear it from missionaries on occasion. Some group from America wants to come over somewhere overseas and spend two weeks on a mission trip. And they arrive on a mission field, OK, that a trained missionary has been spending years and years plowing the ground. And in two weeks, that group can wreck everything. I hear this from these people that are out there, these people, you know, why do they wreck? Well, they wreck things because they're not trained. They come in and they can't even get the gospel straight, they can't even agree among themselves what the gospel is. And we're very sloppy on the gospel. And one person says, you know, ask Jesus into your life. Another person says, pray this prayer with me. And somebody else says, repent of your sins. And the missionary has been working for years and years to prepare the soil for this people to receive the gospel. And you come in and you throw all this terminology in with all your baggage on them. And they haven't got an idea of what you're talking about. And you have just spoiled The labors of someone who has dedicated their whole life to this people, someone who's gone in, he studied the culture, he studied their language, he's studied their conception of who God is so that they can he can give them a clear gospel message. And then this group comes in and throws a whole bunch of muck on the people, you know, and so the guy has to spend the next six months cleaning up the mess that you made. Now, I'm against this. I hope we don't do this, OK? All that does is create more work for that missionary and what the missionaries need. They need people to come. They need carpenters. They need doctors. They need people who come in and they can build a house. They can build a bathroom. They can help develop the facilities so that they can do their work of training the people and being a missionary. OK. So I hope we don't do that because that can be very destructive to these missionaries work. They've given their whole lives to this. The problem with people, American churches who do this, is they really don't know what missions is. They are very poor. They don't even know the definition of missions. So the mission missionary has to be well trained and authorized by a governing authority to proclaim this message of judgment, salvation. Now, having said that, we looked at the universal intent of God. Now, this holds for every epoch of history. that I have here, the five ethics of missions. The goal is always the universal salvation of man. Now, we know not all men will be saved. OK, that's universalism. OK, and that's not what we're talking about. But we're saying that that God set history up so that conceivably all men could be saved in Jesus Christ. OK. So we looked last week at world history, Genesis 1 through 11. And the goal, you'll notice across the board, is always universal. That is, God has a universal intent toward man. And today we'll look at Israel's history in Genesis 12 to Acts 1. Then we'll go to Acts 2 to Revelation 3, which is church history. And later on into Revelation 4 through 19, which is tribulation history, a very short period of time. And then Revelation 20, the millennial history. Um, but in every case, every epic God's design is for all men to be saved. There's just a different method that is used. Okay. So we're, we're looking at that. So the real source of this universal intent really goes back to Genesis one through 11, what we call world history, simply due to the fact that for that era of history, which is about 2000 years, God is dealing with all men directly. There's no mediation. There's no mediatorial nation like Israel or supernation like the church. OK, no mediation. God is just speaking to all men. Now, in this period, we said there were three key passages that show universal intent. We're going to add a fourth tonight that I missed last week. The first is Genesis chapter two, verse seven and Genesis chapter two, verse twenty one. This is the creation of man chapter. When God made man, he did something he never did with any fish, any bird or any animal. He created one man, man, and then out of that one man, he made a woman. OK, so that all men are in Adam. All human DNA, whether you're African, Chinese, American, Jewish, it doesn't matter, male, female, your DNA came from the one man, Adam is derived from him. So there's a mono genetic origin to mankind. Everybody goes ultimately back to one person. There's an essential unity of the human race, and this sets up universal intent of God toward all men so that there are no essentially different kinds of men. In fact, there's an essential sameness to all of us. So universal missions rest, first of all, upon the unique creation of man. That was our first point. Our second point, chapter three, verse seven. The fall of man, Paul gives the New Testament commentary on this in Romans, chapter five, verse 12, that in sin entered the world through one man and death through sin so that death spread to all men because all sin. Notice it never says sin entered the world through two people. It says one man, so that when we compare that with Genesis three, we find That nothing happened when Eve ate. Only something ate happened when Adam ate. So at that point, both of their eyes were open. They knew that they were naked. So there's a unity of the human race and Adam such that when Adam sins, the whole human race sinned. You know, it's not true, OK, that each of us fall individually when we grow up from a baby and then we commit our first personal sin. Then all of a sudden we become a sinner. No, the scriptures are saying that we were sinners in Adam from the very day that he ate the fruit. And that's because we are seminally. If you trace it back, you're inherent. You inherited everything all the way back to him. OK, now, why does God work it this way? People, you know, it's never fair. You know, I mean, why are you holding me accountable for something Adam did? Well, if you reject that, then what also do you have to reject in the New Testament? If you reject that, we all fell in the one man Adam. Then you also end up rejecting the possibility that all men be saved in the one man, Jesus Christ. There's a logic to it. There's a logic. That's because God is a coherent thinker. It's because he's very brilliant and he places things in an order so that all things work together. And so the second point is that universal missions rest upon all men falling in Adam. Let's say it's not that way. And you say, you know, well, We've got several branches of the human race. We've got Branch A over here. They're the yellow people. We got Branch B over here. They're the brown people. We got Branch C over here. They're the white people. We got Branch D over there. They're the red people. And then, you know, suddenly this voice comes in to history. God says, I'm going to promise Group C, you know, the white man, a savior. That savior comes into the world, let's say he dies for sin. And who is he dying for? if the promise is made to C, only group C. Well, he's only dying for group C. His work is unrelated to red people, brown people, and yellow people. What happens to the universality of missions? It gets totally erased, because now we're talking particularity. The promise was made only for branch C and from there we move logically to the idea of limited atonement that what Christ was sent to do on the cross was sent to do only for specific people and not for all men. OK. So let's see how Genesis deals with this by turning to Genesis 3 15. This is the new verse I want to bring in from the first 11 chapters. Adherence to the idea of limited atonement don't really like limited atonement terminology. They would prefer something like particular redemption or definite atonement. OK. And their idea is that Christ did not die for all but only for the elect. OK. So let's see how Genesis deals with this. Genesis 3 15. This is one of the most cryptic verses in all of scripture. At this point. OK. We've had the whole human race having fallen in Adam. Right. It's that that was the darkest hour of the human race. Now, God is having a little fireside chat here with Adam, Eve and the serpent. And you all know this, right? The problem is, is that we read past that point I just mentioned at about 60 miles per hour, and we never think about what we're saying. Now, who is there? Who is God talking to? Adam and Eve are there. Yes. You know, where's the rest of humanity? That's it. That is humanity. The whole human race attended this meeting, OK? So in verse 15, he's that's a key. OK, the whole human race is there. So in verse 15, he's digging out the curse upon the serpent. And in the middle of this curse, you have what is called the proto evangelium. OK, proto meaning first, evangelium meaning good news. This is the first hint of good news. I mean, you just had the worst news in world history. Now, already by verse 15, you have a hint of good news, a hint at salvation. So this is called the proto evangelium. I want to know several things about the verse. So let's just read the verse. And I will put enmity between you and the woman and between your seed and her seed. He shall bruise you on the head and you shall bruise him on the heel. Not an easy verse, mind you. OK, now what's the dominant idea in this verse? If we just back away from it and look at it? Obviously the first. Noun there that the put is the verb, right? I will put now what noun follows that isn't that the dominant thought? Enmity. Adversity. Um. Conflict. There's a conflict from this point forward in human history, it's a conflict that apparently was not there before. OK, now we live all of us in a hostile environment and part and the parties to the conflict are, first of all, first phrase between you and the woman that is between Satan and Eve. OK, that's the first realm of conflict. But then it's extended to the offspring of these two in the second phrase. And between your seed, that Satan's seed, and her seed. Her seed. Okay, that's a strange expression. Because on the one hand, her, that's obviously feminine, right? But seed is masculine. The Hebrew does not agree. You have feminine and masculine. So when the Jews came to translate this into the Greek, they said, now wait a minute, I don't have a noun-verb agreement here. OK, but that's what it says. So they translated it this way. Her sperm. Very strange, because women don't have sperm. But we have this promise that a woman will have a sperm. Now, if you think women having sperm is strange, try this one on for size. Satan also has a sperm. Now we're talking about an immaterial spirit being an angel with a material sperm. Now very strange stuff. OK. Now if you've been around Christian circles circles for a while you know very well where this is headed. But don't assume all that. OK. They didn't. I'm not sure how far this verse can go as many years as different times I've looked at it. You know there are a lot of possibilities as to how far this could go knowing what we know in the New Testament. So, for example, the second phrase between your seed and her seed is ultimately obviously her seed is Christ. But who ultimately is Satan's seed? Is it perhaps Antichrist? Possibly. Is this reference veiled somewhat here to the final conflict between Christ and Antichrist? in Revelation and the Tribulation. Seed can be used corporately. This opens up into the idea that in the New Testament, you have only two kinds of people. You have those who are the seed of Satan and those who are the seed of Christ. There's nobody in between. Jesus said to the Jews who did not believe him, they said, he said, you are of your father, the devil, and you are doing the will of your father. So where all this goes, it can go a long way. There's a lot to it, as we'll see in part. But they didn't know all this. Then we read the last part of the verse. He shall bruise you on the head, you shall bruise him on the heel. So that shows you the conflict will be decided. It will be decided in favor of the women. Woman, see, there's going to be victory by one side. OK, both parties are going to be injured. But one of those injuries there is fatal. The head wound is a fatal wound. So the woman's seed, singular, shall bruise you, Satan, on the head. OK, that's a death wound. I mean, that is a fatal blow. The other injury, the heel injury, that's an injury that you can recover from. So there's a lot to unpack in these verses. The New Testament details it all out. But this is all they had to go on. OK, they didn't know all that. Now, the good news here Is this that in the final analysis, the conflict will be resolved that the woman's sperm is going to defeat Satan. OK, we have that as early as Genesis 315. So what could they get out of this? What do they understand? They could get three points out of this. OK, one, they could understand that there's a conflict. There's a conflict between Satan and Eve. OK, they knew that undoubtedly they knew. Number two. The conflict is going to extend to their seed or offspring. It will extend to the seed or offspring. It's fascinating to watch Satan knowing this verse, because in early Genesis, who does he attack? Well, he attacked just anybody. OK, everybody. And Genesis 12, the seed promise that gets limited to Abraham and Genesis, then Isaac, then Jacob, then Judah and Genesis 49, then David. And you see, he's very particular in where he's attacking. He's not wasting his time everywhere else because he's trying to kill the Messiah. OK. And so as the seed promise gets narrower and narrower, he becomes more focused in his attacks. The third thing they could know is this, that the seed of the woman is going to win the conflict, the seed of the woman is going to win. Now, how do I know that they understood this? I know this because of chapter four, verse one. Now, the man had relations with his wife, Eve, and she conceived and gave birth to Cain. And she said, normally in your Bibles, it says something like, I've gotten a man-child with the help of the Lord. That's a very poor translation. OK, she's giving birth to Cain here, right? Cain. And what does she say? In the Hebrew, she literally says this at the end of that verse. And I want you to write this in your margins. In the Hebrew, she says, I have gotten a man, Yahweh. I have gotten a man, Yahweh. That's the literal Hebrew. Translators never translated that way, and it always masked the point. You know, think about this, OK? You're Eve and God says, look, Eve, you're going to have a sperm. Now, obviously, sperm is a male, you're going to have a male, you're going to have a man, but I don't have sperm, God. So Eve reasons something is going to have to come from the outside here. God is going to have to provide this man. The second thing she connects. Is that my boy, that man is going to defeat Satan. So obviously, if he's going to defeat Satan, he cannot be a fallen sinner, a fallen human being. So she connects the dots somehow. She's thinking my boy is going to be God. I have gotten a man, Yahweh. So when she gets pregnant and she gives birth to that baby boy, Cain, what does she say in verse one? She says, I have gotten a man, Yahweh. She's thinking, you know, we're about to have the final showdown, this conflict that you talked about, God, my boy, who is Yahweh, is going to resolve this conflict. My boy is the savior. OK, did she take Genesis just as a side note, did she take Genesis 315 literally or allegorically? Quite literally, how did Satan take it, by the way, just to see follow the narrative in Chapter four, do you think that he was out to get Cain? Do you think that he do bet he was he was out to destroy Cain spiritually, because obviously he's got him destroyed spiritually, he can't save anybody. And in the process, who did he wipe out to? Abel. Took care of the problem. See, did Satan take the seed promise of Genesis 315 literally? You better believe it very literally. It was a threat. What have I taught you in the early chapters of Acts that one of the key strategies of Satan is Operation Quarantine. He's trying to kill this thing right at the start of history, kill the Messiah. So our point is that, look, God made a promise here of a seed that would defeat Satan's seed. And we know who that seed is now. We know it's Jesus Christ. And who is that man? But who is the promise made to in Genesis 315? Who was there? The whole human race was there. This is a universal promise of a universal savior. So obviously, the seed is going to be victorious for all of us. OK, and that's where we get universal missions out of this verse. OK, universal missions rest upon the seed promise, which is universal in scope. The whole human race was there. So again, I don't mean universal salvation again, I mean universal provision. And when he goes to the cross, he will go to the cross for all. He will be victorious for all. So. We never want to forget the other truth that's so vital, and that is that the provision, what he did on the cross, the substitutionary blood atonement must be appropriated by faith. So we have a unique creation of man, we have number two, the comprehensive fall of man and Adam, and number three, a universal promise of the seed. Fourth passage we talked about last week. was the Noahic Covenant, Genesis chapter 9, verses 8 and 9. When God made a covenant with Noah, he also made it with his three sons, Shem, Ham and Japheth. And every one of us goes back. If we could trace our lineage, if we had the database, for example, on the Internet and you could go on there and the whole database of human history was on there, then you could ultimately track it all the way back and you would go back to either Shem, Ham or Japheth. Most of you here would go back to Japheth, right? So, again, universal intent is implied from the Noahic covenant. So the emphasis in Genesis 1 through 11 has got to be universal intent. God structured the creation, the fall, the promise and the covenant such that each one of each one of those has universal implications. And this universal intent from this point forward permeates scripture. I mean, this is the setup for the rest of world history. So we want to turn our attention to the second major phase of history. If Genesis 1 through 11 dealt with world history today and God dealt with man indiscriminately here just in a direct way, then we want to turn now to a new method in Genesis 12 through Acts 1, what we call Israel's history. And here God begins to work with man discriminately. This is not the I'm going to work with everybody approach. OK, this is the I'm going to work with Abraham approach. Abraham did not initiate this. God initiated this with Abraham. God called Abraham out. Now, why did he do this? Why all of a sudden is God going to be particular in his dealings? Well, because of the rapid spiritual decay of the post-Diluvian civilization. The people after the flood decayed rapidly. The defining event in that era is the construction of the Tower of Babel in Genesis chapter 11. And there's nothing wrong with the construction work. What was wrong was the motives underlying that construction. Something was wrong at the origin of civil our civilization and something that was wrong. Something that was wrong with those people that got off the boat. Noah Shem and Japheth and their wives is that they were sinners. They had a sin nature. So in Genesis chapter 9 verse 1. The first thing God tells them to do is he commands them to scatter and fill the earth, go out, fill the earth. Then if you turn to Genesis 11 for the Babel record, you find that they were rebelling against that there in verse four, they are building this tower, lest we be scattered across the face of the whole earth. They didn't want to be scattered. They didn't want to fill the earth. The tower of Babel was a was a profound act of rebellion. Josephus tells us they built this tower with brick covered with bitumen. That is a waterproofing agent. Now why do you build something with a waterproofing agent on it unless you're trying to do what? Contextually. Some structure that will be safe from another global flood. So obviously they're concerned about that. They're trying to get security. Now, why are they doing this? God promised no global flood. He put a signature in the sky every time you see the rainbow. It's God's promise. I will never flood the earth again. So why aren't they trusting him? The same reason people don't trust him today, because they have short accounts with him. If God treated our forefathers before the flood who were in rebellion against him by judging them, why they reason, should we trust him? Maybe he will judge us too, because we too are rebellious. See the program. Okay. The program is I'm not going to trust him. I've got sure to counsel him, but at the same time, I want security. So they start this building project to get security. It's always this way. A pagan man always resorts to a program of work salvation. You know, we will create a safe environment and we will use whatever means it takes. So they devise this great engineering project wherein they will, Genesis tells us, we will make our name great. And that's another element of pagan man. He's on a quest to make his name great. to spread the glory and the worship of man, to spread the worship of humanity, the kingdom through the kingdom of man. So that's the spirit by which they're carrying out this project. For our purposes, you know why God called Abraham out of that world system has to do with the rapid spiritual decay of that civilization. If God had not called Abraham out, then the universal truths of Genesis 1 through 9 would have been lost forever. So to preserve them, God called Abraham out of the world system to form a counterculture, a system of counterclaims. OK, a system of counterclaims that stands against the world system. Now, that's what we're talking about, whether we're talking about politics, environmentalism, globalism, it doesn't matter. What are the counterclaims to what the world is saying out there? They come from the word of God. These this is the system of counterclaims. So. Abraham is called out to be a culture that would preserve truth that this this counterclaims and bring into the world a savior that is the seat of the woman. So Abraham is the beginning of a new mission missions methodology. Before it was a direct methodology. Now it's going to be indirect. It's going to be mediated. OK, through the nation Israel. Now I'm going to work with one nation. He's not saying no missions. He's not saying that. He's saying missions through my nation Israel. That's what he's saying. They will be the conduit. They will be the channel. They will be the source of blessing to reach the world. So we want to look at that strategy tonight. Our first passage to show this is Genesis chapter 12, Genesis 12. Turn there and while you do that also turn to Nehemiah chapter nine. Ezra Nehemiah. Before the Psalms Psalms is in the middle of your Bible and back up to the left. Before Job and so forth and you'll find Nehemiah. Now. Genesis chapter twelve verse one. Now the Lord said to Abram, go forth from your country and from your relatives and from your father's house to the land, which I will show you. Now, where did God say this? Okay. Previous verse, verse 32 would lead you to believe it happened in Haran. Haran is up here in the north. Okay. This is the promised land over here. And here's the modern day Iraq. Uh, Babylon is here and where the tower of Babel was and so forth. Now that's what it sounds like from here. But the problem with that one problem is Nehemiah 9-7. In Nehemiah 9-7, in the midst of this historical recital, after the exile, the Levites announced this verse. It says, You are the Lord God who chose Abraham and brought him out from where? Ur of the Chaldees. Now, Ur is not up here by her. Ur is down here in Mesopotamia. The region of the Tower of Babel. Now, the point is, is that what happened in Genesis 12, one, as you read, that did not happen in Iran. It was a past event. God had already called him out of the world system. That post-Diluvian world that was antagonistic to God. So this should be reading more something like in Genesis 12, one. Now, the Lord had said to Abraham, he'd already said it. And the words he says, the very first words are go forth. Now, the go forth is the critical principle here. Go forth is the principle of separation. Abraham has to first separate from the world system in order to reach the world system. Now, this is counterintuitive because you say, well, gosh, if I'm going to reach people with the gospel, I have to be with those people. I can't go away from them. But the word of God insists that the first step to reaching these people is that you've got to get away from them. Get out. Why? To get some training. That's why. To get some spiritual depth so you can go back and be effective. See, you know, this is why we have seminaries. This is why men need to be trained, see, in the languages. They need to get out of the world system and get intense training in the languages and systematic theology so they can think across the whole spectrum of the word of God. Languages so they can exegete the word of God, apologetics so they can defend the word of God. Church history, so they don't fall into the traps and errors that men across the centuries have fallen into. So Abraham had to wholly depart from the world system first. Now, look at Joshua 24. Hold your place in Genesis, go to Joshua. The sixth book, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, Joshua chapter 24. Now here's the world system that Abraham lived in in Joshua 24. Get a load of this. You think Abraham was called out because Abraham was such a good old boy in verse two of Joshua 24. Where did he live? It says that he lived beyond the river. Now that is the river Euphrates. This river here. that runs along the Fertile Crescent, the Euphrates River. He lived beyond it in a city called Ur over here. And who did he serve, according to this verse, along with his fathers and forefathers? Other gods. Abraham grew up. He lived in a polytheistic culture. His whole life was built around polytheism. So he had to separate out from that culture. Now, looking back at Genesis 12, we'll see why he had to separate out. Now, here's where this gets into missions, OK? In verse three of Genesis 12, last phrase, what's the ultimate goal of the separation? And in you, Abram, all the families of the earth will be blessed. See, look, he had to be separated out first in order to reach the goal of blessing of all the families of the earth. And notice that Abraham in this verse is the conduit. He's the channel. He's the mediator of the worldwide blessing. But he's got to separate out first before this can happen. Now, if you want to see those families that he's talking about there, just turn back to Genesis chapter 10. Here's your commentary on where the sons of Noah scattered after the Tower of Babel, after God confused the languages, the people scattered, right? So these people are going to go out from this central region of Mesopotamia right here. They're going to go out in different directions. Obviously, Abram doesn't go that far, does he? He just goes right here to Ur. There's a reason for that, which we won't get into. But in verse 2, which son is being trotted out? Genesis 10-2. These are the sons of which son? Japheth. And in verse 5, what does it say when it concludes Japheth? How are they going to be separated out in verse 5? Everyone according to his nation, according to his family. There's the word. Verse six begins the sons of who? Him. Drop down to verse 20. How are the sons of him going to be separated? According to their families. See that? Verse 21, final son of Noah is Shem. And in verse 30, drop down there. How are the sons of Shem going to be separated? According to their families. Now, do you see the familial pattern here? Do you think that Abraham got the picture when God said Genesis 12 3? Isn't isn't this a universal task that he's being called to? See, I call you, Abraham, out of the world system so you can get with it spiritually, and only then can you be a blessing to all the families. But first, you've got to come out. OK, come over here to the land. I will show you. Now, notice it's more than a spiritual departure, isn't it? It's a departure. It's a geographic. Departure. Now, we know why he had to go out, ultimately, God's going to make him a nation, right, and nations have to have land and to be a distinct nation, you have to have borders around that land. You can't just have open borders. If there's no line of separation, then there's no distinction. You can't have a nation. You know, is God for border patrol? Yes. You know, we can't figure this stuff out. What are we, morons? God, he wants to keep nations distinct. What in the world is Genesis 10, if not a distinction between nations? He separated them all out, and what has man been trying to do ever since God separated us? Tear down the borders. You know, it's just a modern. OK, look, it's just a modern. What you're seeing right now is just a modern Bible project. That's all it is. We destroy all boundaries. We create a global economy, international law, international currency. That is the way that pagan man works. OK, why? Why are they doing this? Why is this such an important agenda of the world's political powers? Well, because they want security. Global security, security from what? Security from God. We don't want him to have to have him in our face anymore. OK, we've got short accounts with him. So what we do is we recreate the world. We create the kingdom of man, a place where it's safe to sin. It's just another attempt by man to make his name great. OK, so we create a new world order. Now, it's the height of spiritual rebellion. OK, it's profoundly arrogant of man. But they had it then, and we have it now. God's solution then? Call out Abraham. God's solution now? Send back Jesus Christ. So the first point of Genesis 12 through Acts 1, missions, is that universal missions in Israel's era require separation from the world system. Abraham had to go out. You have to get out first and get trained before you can be effective. After that, then people can get blessed. So Abraham has a worldwide call by leaving the world. A worldwide call by leaving the world. The world system that is second point turned Exodus 19 second point of missions in Genesis 12 through Acts one is this. that universal missions in Israel's era requires serving Yahweh. This is the servant motif that Israel was to be a servant of the nations. So if Abraham, Isaac and Jacob were already the people of God, they'd been separated by from the world system. Yes. God called them out by the Abrahamic covenant. Then Israel is to become a national servant of Yahweh in the Mosaic covenant, the law. So Exodus 19. So they're going to hopefully become a servant nation. So in Exodus 19, here's the prep words. Here's the words of preparation for the Mosaic law. Verse three. Notice Moses went up to God and the Lord called to him from the mountain. He's Mount Sinai saying, Thus, you shall say to the house of Jacob and tell the sons of Israel. Verse four. This is the first thing he's to tell them. Moses is going to go to you yourselves. I've seen what I did to the Egyptians, how I bore you on eagle's wings and brought you to myself. Now, notice God did not come up and say, Moses, now, look, what I want you to go down there and tell him is, hey, look, you guys serve me. And you better serve me or else or anything like that. You know, God never does that. He always comes and says, now, look, I have done something for you. Now, will you serve me? Me having done for you. Now, will you worship me? See now? Don't ever forget that. OK, it's what he has done for us. That is the proper motive for serving him. OK, you know, we say in the Protestant church the importance of the doctrine of justification by faith alone, that we are justified, that is, we are perfectly righteous. God of mere grace, both grants and imputes to me the perfect righteousness of Christ as if I had never had nor will sin. And I myself accomplished all the obedience Christ rendered for me. That is settled in the high court of heaven. Nothing can overturn that. Now, if he's done all that for me now, I have a motive. I have an environment in which I can thrive and grow spiritually. See. Now, I'm his child, I know that Protestant doctrine tells me that the word of God tells me that it's just a reflection of the word of God, I know I am his child. Now, you put a child in your house and you make him work to be your child, to be accepted as your child. And you will not create an environment in which that child can thrive and grow. That's one of the massive problems with Roman Catholicism. That justification is put on at the tail. It's at the end of life. Maybe if you were good enough, if you paid enough indulgences, if you said enough prayers to the saints, if you did all these things, maybe then you will be accepted before God. Where is the motive to grow and thrive spiritually When it's a constantly, you're trying to find acceptance and you're out of out of fear of God's righteous judge. That is not a context for growth. We all know that intuitively with our own children. No, we accept our children unconditionally. Yes, they do wrong, they get disciplined, but they're always our children that can never be lost. That's a massive difference. And God says here, look, I did this for you. I bore you on eagle's wings and brought you to myself now. Verse five. Now, then, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, then you shall be my own possession among all the peoples. My own possession, my treasure, OK, that's specific, isn't it? You will be my specific people. But then notice the next phrase. For is that a universal phrase? Yeah, that's Pretty universal for all the earth is mine. So there are universal implications to this. Somehow all the earth is going to be served by the nation Israel. And we know hindsight, OK, and looking a bit ahead here, but ultimately, this is looking to Jesus Christ, isn't it? That he's going to be the one who's the savior of the whole world, he's going to be the ultimate servant. But let's see how the world is going to be drawn to Israel and the Savior, verse six. And you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. OK, three things we want to note here for the first thing we want to note is that Israel already had a relationship with God. God would not have delivered her out of Egypt if she didn't have a relationship. Second thing versus five and six, they are given three promises. What are they? Verse five, you will be my what? Own possession. Verse six, two things, you will be my what? Kingdom of priests, and lastly, you will be what? Holy Nation, those three things. But is there a condition to them becoming that? In verse five. Yeah, what is it? Obedience, obedience to the law. Isn't it? They got to obey the Mosaic law to become this. Now, what does the verse eight say? What how did the people respond to this? Oh, yes, Lord, we will do all that you have said, you know, blanket promise of perfect obedience. Sounds sort of like me when I was a kid, you when you were a kid and my own kids. Oh, yeah, mommy, I'll never do that again. Now, we'll come back to this in a few weeks. But I don't have time to go there. But let me say this, Deuteronomy 529. If you turn to Deuteronomy 529, it's a parallel of this. It's just another account of this. And in that context, we get a little bit more information. And what's fascinating about it is that God says this in Deuteronomy 529. He says, Oh, that they had such a heart to be able to do it. In other words, Israel didn't have the heart to do it. They had an old, depraved, sin nature. And out of the old sin nature, there's no way they can perfectly obey. And so that looks forward to the fact that somehow they have to get a new heart. Remember that the Old Testament is talking in the New Covenant about Israel getting a new heart. I will place my spirit within her and she will need to teach her neighbor, et cetera, et cetera. But they will all know me from the least to the greatest. And they will commit perfect obedience. Now, that's not in the Old Testament. When is that? Anybody know? When will they do that in the millennial kingdom, the millennial history? See, if we back up, you know, we go all the way back here. Uh, that's over here. The nation is still the mediator. This time she'll be successful in her mission, but not here in the old Testament. But that was the goal. The goal was look, and I have to summarize pretty quickly. Israel, if you will obey my law, I will make you a kingdom of priests. If they're going to become a kingdom, then a theocratic kingdom, then a kingdom's got to have a king, right? Well, of course, God would be their king. And they would produce the greatest culture, artistically, musically, intellectually, wisdom, government, politics, everything. Now, they were doing this, OK, at one stage in their history during the reign of King David. They were following the law. He was leading the nation in obedience to the Mosaic law. And what was the result? I call it the golden era of Solomon, because that's the period where you see the fruit of that kingdom, the greatest wealth, the greatest wisdom. What was this accomplishing for the nations around them? You think they heard about this? The greatest military, the greatest economy, the greatest politician, the wisest man on earth, the most wealth. You think people were looking at that? You better believe they were looking at that. That was the whole intent. See, come to Israel. God would make them the greatest culture and nation and society on earth. Now, after that, they declined spiritually and the nation went into apostasy and exile. And so this was never fulfilled. Israel was not a separated people. See, that's what they were to be. They were to separate, the law was to separate them from all the other nations, so they didn't look like anybody else. They look different, they look funny. You think being a Christian is supposed to just mix in with everybody? No, it's exactly the same way. You're supposed to look different. How can you be a witness if you look the same? How can you be a witness to the world? If Christian music is rock music and that is stupid, that is absurd. OK, that is not Christian music. Rock, Christian rock is not Christian. That is false, OK, by nature of the principle of separation. You develop something unique that reflects divine viewpoint. I mean, you can listen to that kind of music. Just don't try to call it Christian, OK? That that's ridiculous. So Israel is to be separated by their law from the world. This would make them look unique and the nations would come to them and they were to be the servant of Yahweh and following the law. They did not do this. Now let's turn finally to Isaiah chapter 42. This is the final point. Israel failed. So. By God's grace, by God's grace alone, Israel did. Succeed in bringing in the servant par excellence. The servant, the Lord Jesus Christ, see, so our final point is that to the Old Testament is to this ethic of history is that universal missions. Is met by the the servants death and resurrection. So these are called the songs of Isaiah. OK, there are three of them. Some people break them into four, but the first is in Isaiah 42. And what this shows is that ultimately this call to a servanthood look forward to one seed. One savior, one obedient servant, the Messiah, Jesus Christ, who would offer one sacrifice for sin once for all. Isaiah 42, verse one. Behold, my servant. This is the Messiah whom I uphold, my chosen one, my elect one in whom my soul delights. I have put my spirit upon him. He will bring forth justice to the what? Is that Israel or is that every nation? Verse four, he will not be disheartened or crushed until he has established justice in the earth and the coastlands will wait expectantly for his law, the coastlands. I am the Lord, I have called you in righteousness. I will also hold you by the hand and watch over you, and I will appoint you as a covenant to the people as a light to the nations. Chapter forty nine. Verse six, second song of a servant song, Isaiah, forty nine, verse six. He says, Chapter forty nine, verse six, It is too small a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the preserved ones of Israel. You know, look, it's too small that the Messiah is only related to Israel. That's what he's saying. I will also make you a light of the nations. Is that universal or what? Why? So that my salvation may reach the end of the earth. That's pretty extensive. That's universal missions. And the last servant song, Isaiah 52. And 53, the longest. And many of you know this, but Chapter 52, verse 13, 52, 13. Behold, my servant will prosper. He will be high and lifted up and greatly exalted, just as many were astonished at you, my people. So his appearance was marred more than any man and his form more than the sons of men. Thus, he will sprinkle many nations. Kings will shut their mouths on account of him. You know, this is Jesus, the Messiah, right? And we go into chapter three, 53, verse three, he was despised and forsaken of men. Verse four, surely our Greece, he himself bore to his substitutionary atonement, our sorrows, he carried. We, Israel, we esteemed him stricken, smitten of God, afflicted, you know, but he was pierced through for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. The chastening for our well-being fell upon him and by his scourgings we are healed. All of us like sheep have gone astray. Here's the universal depravity of man. Each of us has turned to his own way but the Lord has caused the iniquity of us all to fall on him. Universal. He was oppressed. He was afflicted. Yet he did not open his mouth like a lamb that is led to slaughter. And like a sheep that is silent before its shearers so he did not open his mouth. Verse ten, but the Lord was pleased to crush him, putting him to grief. If he would render himself as a guilt offering, he will see his offspring. There's our word from Genesis 315. He will see his offspring, his seed. Obviously, spiritual seed. Those who place their trust in Jesus as the Messiah. Are his seed, see? We are of the same faith of Abraham. where Abraham see also his feet and he will see his feet that is resurrection right. Not only will he be crushed but he will be raised he will prolong his day that the eternal life and the good pleasure of the Lord will prosper in his hand. As a result of the anguish of his soul he will see it and be satisfied by his knowledge the righteous one my servant that is the Messiah will justify the many as he will bear their iniquities. Therefore I will allot him a portion with the great. And he will divide the booty with the strong, because he poured out himself to death and was numbered with the transgressors. Yet he himself bore the sin of many and interceded for the transgressors. You know, there's this debate that goes on every year between Jewish rabbis and typically someone for Jews, for Jesus or something like that. Who is the servant of Isaiah 40 through 50, those chapters? And the nation Israel, the rabbis argue that they are the servant, that the nation is the servant. Isaiah is arguing no. One person is the ultimate servant, the servant par excellence. He is the one who is separated from humanity in the sense of no sin. He is the one who is the servant of Yahweh. He is the one in whom is salvation, not in the nation Israel. They failed. But in the future, of course, they will be given a new heart, and they will play a role again in missions in the millennium. But Jesus Christ is the answer. His once-for-all sacrifice for all men. All right, let's close with a word of prayer.