Hello and welcome to our broadcast. Again we're looking in Genesis chapter 20. It says Abraham journeyed from thence and he got some more problems here. We're going to look at it. Have your Bible ready. Well, we read in chapter 20 in verse 1, Abraham journeyed from thence toward the south. You've heard the phrase, everything went south. Well, here he goes again. Toward the south country and dwelt between Kadesh and Shur and sojourned in Gerar. And Abraham said of Sarah his wife, she is my sister. And Abimelech, king of Gerar, sent and took Sarah. Now, you think he would have learned from the last time he went through this nonsense. I think sometimes the only thing we learn from our mistakes is that we don't learn from our mistakes. Well, we have seen that life for Abraham and life for you and I is a life of constant battle between faith and the flesh. We have two natures. If you're a born-again Christian, God didn't make over that old nature. He gave you a brand new one, and one nature is of God, and one nature is of the flesh, and we wrestle with both of those, and we will wrestle with both of those until we get to heaven. That new nature can't sin, and that old nature can't do anything but sin, and we constantly have a battle. I read years ago that an old Indian had two dogs who were always fighting with each other, He had a white dog and he had a black dog. And somebody said, which dog wins? And he said, oh, whichever one I say, sick'em. And you know, it's basically the same thing. Whatever nature we feed, that's the nature that's going to grow. And Abraham had probably been not having his time with God and his time at his altar and time when he got alone with the Lord, kind of let that slip. And now we find him in trouble again in chapter 20. Well, the Bible says these things are written for our admonition. And, you know, let's be warned. It says at the end of the age, these things are written for us. It happened and they're written so we can learn from them. Not only is it a warning, but it's hope when we fail. We find here that God did not just discard Abraham. He is still working with him and the Lord understands and we need to understand that Satan never gives up he never gives up and so we can be very thankful for verse 2 it says but God but God came to Abimelech in a dream by night and said unto him behold thou art but a dead man for the woman which thou hast taken for she is a man's wife and in his mercy once again God steps in and saves the day for Abraham Well, now in chapter 21 we have some major family problems here. We read, And the Lord visited Sarah as he said, and the Lord did unto Sarah as he had spoken. For Sarah conceived and bare Abraham a son in his old age, at the set time of which God has spoken unto him. As we've said many times, God is never in a hurry, but he's never late. And he did what he said he was going to do. We read in verse 2, And Abraham called the name of his son that was born unto him, whom Sarah bare to him, Isaac. And Abraham circumcised his son Isaac, being eight days old, as God had commanded him. and Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born unto him. Well, by this time Ishmael, the other son that Abraham had by Hagar, is now 13 years old. And we read in verse number 9, And Sarah saw the son of Hagar, the Egyptian, which she had borne unto Abraham, mocking. Wherefore she said unto Abraham, Cast out this bondwoman and her son, for the son of this bondwoman shall not be heir with my son, even with Isaac. And the thing was very grievous in Abraham's sight because of his son. And God said unto Abraham, Let it not be grievous in thy sight because of the lad, and because of thy bondwoman, in all that Sarah hath said unto thee. Hearken unto her voice, for in Isaac shall thy seed be called." Well, it's a hard day here for Abraham, and it's nothing that he hasn't caused himself thirteen years earlier. In any event, he's got to make a decision here, and it says in verse number 14, And Abraham rose up early in the morning, and took bread and a bottle of water, and gave it unto Hagar, putting it on her shoulder and the child, and sent her away. And she departed, and wandered in the wilderness of Beersheba. And the water was spent in the bottle, and she cast the child under one of the shrubs, And she went and sat down over against him a good way off, as it was a bow shot, for she said, Let me not see the death of the child. And she sat over against him and lifted up her voice and wept. And God heard the voice of the lad, and the angel of God called unto Hagar out of heaven, and said unto her, What aileth thee, Hagar? Fear not, for the Lord hath heard the voice of the lad where he is. Arise, lift up the lad, and hold him in thine hand, for I will make him a great nation. And God opened her eyes, and she saw a well of water, and she went and filled the bottle with water, and gave the lad drink, and God was with the land and he grew and dwelt in the wilderness and became an archer. Verse 21 tells us he dwelt in the wilderness of Paran and his mother took him a wife out of the land of Egypt. And now we come to chapter 22. And here we have an amazing story. It says it came to pass after these things that God did tempt Abraham and said unto him, Abraham. And he said, behold, here I am. And he said, take now thy son. thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah, and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains, which I will tell thee of." What an amazing thing! God calls to Abraham, and God's voice is immediately heard by Abraham, and his response is quick. Behold, here I am." Well, he said, I want you to do something now, Abraham. I want you to take thy son, thine only Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah, and offer him there for a burnt offering on one of the mountains that I will tell thee of. Well, you would think the next verse would say, God, this doesn't make any sense. You said this child was going to be having offsprings that we couldn't number, and I can't kill them. That doesn't make any sense. What does it say in verse 3? Abraham rose up early in the morning, and saddled his ass, and took two of his young men with him, and Isaac his son, and claimed the wood for the burnt offering, and rose up and went unto the place of which God had told him. God, it says he did tempt it, that's a strong word. The word in the Hebrew really means he tested Abraham. He said, now are you going to do what I'm going to tell you to do, or are you not? He got up early, it says. Maybe he wanted to get up before Sarah found out what was going on. How would she respond to this? He says he saddled his ass, took two young men, took what they needed to do the offering, and went unto the place which God had told him. It was a three-day journey for him to get there. We read in verse 4, on the third day, Abraham lifted up his eyes and saw the place of far off. And Abraham said unto his young men, Abigi here with the ass, and I and the lad will go yonder and worship. and come again. Now he says he's going to worship. I've mentioned a few times in this broadcast that I don't know that we know what worship is anymore. I think we've lost that over the years. We've replaced it with our, well, we call it a morning worship service where we sing, pray, sing announcements, offering, do the sermon, and hurry up and get out of there by 12 noon lest everybody had barbecued pasture for lunch. That is not what worship is. There's nothing even close to what worship is. This is the first time in the Bible where we have the word worship mentioned here and he's going up to the top of this mountain to sacrifice his son. He said, I and the lad will go yonder and worship and come again to you. Well the Hebrew word for worship is spelled S-H-A-C-H-A-H and it is translated worship 99 times in the Bible. It is also translated bow 31 times and bow down 18 times and reverence another 5 times. Now, we have here in chapter 22 and verse number 5 the first time we have the word worship that has been translated in English, worship, but we have it one time prior to that back in chapter 18 and verse number 2. In that portion of scripture it is translated bowed himself and it's talking about when the Lord appeared in chapter 18 verse number 1 and Abraham went out and it says in verse number 2 that he bowed himself toward the ground. That is the same word that is translated worship here in our text. However, we have it one more time, and that is in Genesis chapter 19, and verse 1 says, There came two angels to Sodom at Eban, and Lot sat in the gate, that means the government of Sodom, and Lot seeing them rose up to meet them and he bowed himself with his face toward the ground. So once again we have this word that has been translated worship 99 times. Here again it is translated bowed. So what does this tell us? It tells us that worship can be sincere as it was with Abraham in chapter 18 and verse number 2 and as it was with Abraham here in this portion of scripture where we see he went up on the mountain mountain to worship, it can be sincere or it can be very insincere as it was with Lot when he bowed himself down. You see some tremendous things that are very different between this worshipping or bowing down of these two men. If you study it back there where Lot bowed down, he said, you men need to come in here and stay with me and get out of here early tomorrow. He didn't want them around. where you find back in chapter 18 when Abraham was worshipping he was totally the opposite and he wanted them to stay and he was as a servant taking care of them and bowed himself and he got them some water and a morsel of bread and he said comfort your hearts and so on. A major difference in both of these situations that are referred to as worship. Now as we go into the New Testament and you look for the word worship the first time you find it was when the wise men came to visit Jesus and it says when they saw the star they rejoiced with exceeding great joy and when they were come into the house they saw the young child with Mary his mother and fell down and worshipped him and when they had opened their treasures they presented unto him gifts gold and frankincense and myrrh. And so we see here the first time you have the word worship, and every time that Greek word is used, it has been translated worship in the New Testament. That is, it has been translated worship 60 times. So there's an amazing study here, both in the Old Testament and in the New Testament, if we're going to follow it through. Now back in Genesis chapter 18, we read their worship included here for Abraham when the Lord came. It says in verse 2, he ran to meet him. Then it says he bowed himself toward the ground. Then it says he made a request for him to stay in verse 3, which was opposite to what Lot did. And then we see himself referred to as a servant twice here in verse number three and then again in a couple of verses later. And so he says as a servant, he got them water, he wanted them to have rest, he wanted them bread, he wanted them to have comfort. He had a desire for others to get involved in the serving of the Lord. He goes to Sarah and he says, look, let's get some stuff ready for the Lord and these two men. Verse 7 we see the giving of a tender calf, the best he had, and then it says in verse 8, he set it all before them and then he stood by and just relaxed in the fact that he had been of service to the Lord and these two men. And so we can see from our verse in chapter 22 of the book of Genesis, and verse number 5, Abraham said unto the young men, abide ye here with the ass, and I and the lad will go yonder and worship and come again to you. And Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it upon Isaac his son, and he took the fire in his hand and a knife, and they went both of them together. Well, sometime very soon Abraham's going to have to explain to Isaac what's going on here. Isaac is not a little boy as we see in some of the artwork. He is 33 years old when this is taking place. Well, you hear the music in the background that tells us we're out of time again, so we'll have to continue here in our next broadcast. Hope you can tune in. We'll try to make it plain, and we will try to make it simple. you