Genesis chapter 22. You remember last time, the last few weeks, we've been looking at biblical worship and what the Bible has to say about our worship. And the last two weeks ago, last week I wasn't here, but on that note, just thank you for your prayers for our trip to Puerto Rico. We had a blessing and blessing and blessing on top of blessing while we were there. And it was just a blessing to see a lot. We had a pastor's conference while we were there. and a lot of the pastors that were there in those churches right now that were there at the conference. They were in college, in Bible school, or teenagers, back when we were in Puerto Rico. And it was a blessing to see how God's, they've grown up now, they've gotten through Bible college, and now they're the pastor of their own church, and God's using them in good ways down there. It's a blessing to see. And so y'all keep praying for the ministry down there in Puerto Rico. God's really blessing it. Pray for them also. A lot of them are still, believe it or not, recovering from the hurricane that happened five years ago. Maria. And you fly over, when you're flying into Puerto Rico, you still see a lot of houses covered with the blue tarps they passed out from FEMA and everything. They just haven't gotten their roof fixed, haven't gotten their house fixed. People are living in open homes. Still. So do pray for them down there. They're still recovering from that, but keep praying for the ministry down there with Brother Harmon, and God's really blessing. It is a joy to see. Genesis chapter 22. Remember we left, we started looking at the setting of our biblical worship, the setting of it, and we're using the example here of Abraham and when God had commanded Abraham to go sacrifice Isaac, his only son. And we, we, we looking at it, we mentioned how, you know, we like look at this and say, man, why in the world would God, God never condoned human sacrifice and never did he do that. But here he tells Abraham to go sacrifice his one and only son. And we, at first we stopped and we think, now we know the whole story. We know how God stopped him. Once he started to sacrifice him, he, he started to raise that knife and God stopped him and provided a ram. Amen. We know the rest of the story, but Abraham did not. at that point. And so he's going up to this mountain to worship, and this is the first time in the Bible the word worship is used. Now, there were people worshiping God before Abraham. We know that. We see that in the Bible. But the word itself, worship, was used right here for the first time, okay? We remember worship means to bow down, to prostrate oneself before a superior, to kiss toward, remember we used the example there of bowing down before a superior and kissing their hand, kissing their ring, sowing reverence, sowing respect and humility before them. We talked about that. And we started looking at the setting that was around Abraham when he was commanded to go up to this mountain and to sacrifice his son and worship God. to worship God, and the first thing that we looked at with this was the source of Abraham's worship. Just to review a little bit, there in verse one, it says, and 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 verse two starts out with, and he said, who's talking there? God said it. God is the one giving the command to Abraham here. We see the source of Abraham's worship was God. Okay, and we use that as an example that true worship for us today always starts with God and what we see right here in His Word, right here in the Word of God. That's where our basis comes from here at Trinity Baptist Church and other churches. Our basis of how we worship, who we worship, and things that we do to worship, all is based out of the Word of God. Okay, so we see here that it starts with God. When we talk about the basis of it starting with the source of God, you know, if we're going to worship God, doesn't it make sense to do it His way? Doesn't that only make sense? You know, if you hire employees for a business, you obviously should already have some sort of qualifications and some sort of job list that they will be responsible for. But what if you hire somebody and they wanna make their own way of doing things and make their own job list of what they're gonna do? It just doesn't make sense. They're not gonna get the job. They're not gonna keep the job, if anything. Well, when we come to worship God, doesn't it make sense that we worship Him the way He wants to be worshiped? And that's what we see in the Word of God. We read that from our source, the Word of God. We worship Him in His way. in the manner that he prescribed us to worship. And we made this comment here, and I have it highlighted. I love this phrase here. It says, genuine biblical worship is all that I am responding to all that God is. And that's exactly what the word of God teaches us to do. We respond to God the way he is revealed in the word of God. We use the example, you know, God says that He loves us. Amen? Aren't you glad that God loves you? You know, not only that, He loved us so much He sent His Son to die on the cross for our sin. And then that he promises that he will never leave us nor forsake us, that he will supply our needs. You know, he tells us that he is our heavenly father. The list can keep going on and on and on of everything that God is and everything that the Bible describes God as he is. When we get to the point when we're reading the word of God and the Holy Spirit's work in our heart and we begin to understand who God is, what he's done for us and what he continues to do for us day after day after day, We respond to how he's revealed himself to us. How do we respond to him? In worship. In worship. We respond with humility. We respond with gratitude. We respond with reverence and worship to him. All right, so we saw that the source of it, and then we also looked at worship. We saw Abraham's submission in his worship. If we're gonna worship God, We have to submit to him. If Abraham was gonna worship God, he had to obey God's command to offer Isaac, his son, as a sacrifice to God. Because God had commanded him, that's how you're gonna go worship me. How did Abraham respond? We're not gonna read all the verses there, but down in verse two, through the next several verses, we see that, first of all, he rose up early in the morning. God spoke to him. Next morning, he rose up early. It says that he saddled his donkey. He took two of his young men with him. He took Isaac. He got the wood for the burnt offering. Then he rose up and went his way to the place that God had told him. It was complete obedience right away. He didn't hesitate. He didn't try to compromise with God. He didn't say, okay, God, I'm gonna get up this morning and I'm gonna get the donkey ready, I'll get these two men and my son Isaac in the wood, and then I'm gonna bring a couple sheep just in case that you change your mind or this, that. He didn't try to compromise with God, he just obeyed God in the way he told him to go worship him. That took submission. Do you think it took submission when he went into his son's bedroom that morning and started waking him up, knowing what he's about to do? That took submission to God. Abraham's worship manifested itself in humble submission to the will of God. Another word for that? Obedience. Obedience. Sure, his heart was heavy as he went about that morning. I'm sure it was. I'm sure he was troubled. I'm sure he was maybe even confused. God, what are you trying to do here? What are you trying to show me? But he submitted to the will of God and he worshiped him that way. You know, we mentioned how it's one thing to know what God says, but it's another thing altogether to obey what God says. You know, there's a lot of folks who know what the Word of God says, but their worship's not true. It's not complete because they're not yet obeying what God says. They go hand in hand with one another. Then the third thing that we looked at, and this is where we left off with this point here, is that Abraham's worship required sacrifice. It required sacrifice. His worship was not cheap. What do we mean by that? Look in verse two again. Now, picture yourself, put yourself in Abraham's shoes when he's hearing this from God. It says, and he said, take now thy son, thine only son, whom thou lovest. You think about this. God didn't just say, take your son. He made sure Abraham understood. He knew who his son was to Abraham. It wasn't just his son, his only son. The only son that he had. Not only that, but God even reminded him, whom thou lovest. whom thou lovest. He wanted to make it clear Abraham understood that his worship to God was going to take sacrifice. It was going to cost him something. In this case, Abraham is thinking it's going to cost him his son's life. You know, in light of Isaac, you think was the light of Abraham's life. It was the dearest possession that he had. Isaac represented all of Abraham's hopes for the future. God had promised everything to Abraham through his son, Isaac. This is the one most valuable thing that Isaac had, was his son. And then God commands Abraham to take that which is most precious to him. and sacrifice him to God. Abraham's worship was costly. True worship involved him making the greatest sacrifice possible. It may or may not happen in your life that to worship God is gonna cost you dearly one day. But are you willing to do it? Are you willing to do it? Real worship is always costly. Even David said in, I don't know, I'm sorry, in 2 Samuel, it says, neither will I offer burnt offerings unto the Lord my God, David was talking here, neither will I offer burnt offerings unto the Lord my God of that which doth cost me nothing. David understood that, listen, sacrifice for God, worship of God costs something. It costs something. We looked at different examples throughout the Bible. Mary of Bethany, she sacrificed her pride, her glory, and all of her treasure just for the opportunity to worship Jesus. You think of the wise men that came to see the child in the house there after he was born down in Egypt there and they go in there. You think about these men were men of authority, men of power. And they came in and bowed themselves down to a child. and gave him treasures, it cost them something. All down through the ages and through the years, millions of people have given their very lives as a sacrifice to simply worship God. To worship God, it cost them dearly. Real worship is a sacrifice, but God also reminds us, we said it's a sacrifice making. What did we mean by that? It's talking about that through worship, through true worship of God. God is honored and the saint who worship is blessed. What you find is that the sacrifice that we make when we worship God, it's far outweighed by the blessings we receive back from God. And that's the only way to experience that is to practice that. Now tonight we pick up down in verse five here. We wanna see that Abraham's worship also meant separation. Separation, look in verse five. And Abraham said unto his young men, abide ye here with the ass and I and the lad will go yonder and worship and come again You think about that this small band, you know, Abraham, he had woke up those two men to go with him to worship, and then he woke up his son, and the four of them together traveled out to this place where God had commanded him to sacrifice his son. And as they're coming up to it, not quite all the way up there yet, but getting close to it, he stopped these young men and he told them, abide here. Wait here while we go up and worship God, me and my son. These two young men, you think about this, who did God command to go worship? Abraham, and who did he have to take with him? Isaac. Those were the two that God commanded to go and worship him. These two other men were not a part of that. Now they helped up to this point, just, I guess, carrying the load and leading the animals, doing whatever needed to be done, helping Abraham as a servant there. But they came to a point, Abraham had to stop and say, listen, from this point out, it's just me and my son. We're the ones commanded to go worship. These two young men, whoever they were, whatever part they played, their part was not in the worship experience of it. In fact, for some reason, and with what we're gonna look at here in just a moment, they would have done nothing but hinder Abraham. You can imagine if they went up with Abraham, picture it for just a second. They helped build the altar with Abraham and Isaac. And they're used to probably doing that, building an altar to God and stuff. They've seen Abraham do this before. They take the wood that they brought up there and they start putting the wood on the altar with Abraham and Isaac. But what do you think the reaction would have been when Abraham grabbed his son Isaac and started binding him up and then placing him on the altar? They probably would have panicked. They probably said, whoa, whoa, whoa, we can't do this, Abraham, you gotta stop, you gotta stop. They would have hindered Abraham's worship. They would have hindered complete obedience to God and his worship. So Abraham told them they had to be left behind. The only two allowed to end the place of worship was Abraham and the treasure of his heart, Isaac. There's a lesson that we can learn here from this point with separation here. There's a lesson for the person who would worship God today. We all know that there's many things in life that would hinder our worship. Especially in the world that we live in today, there's a lot of things that could get between you and you worshiping God. There's a whole list of things. The devil really doesn't have to try hard because the world does a good enough, and this flesh does a good enough job of doing it on its own. Just like these two young men, things would intrude themselves into our worship that have no business being there. And it happens all the time. It happens so easily. Sometimes we need to stop and we need to tell those things, abide here, while I go yonder to worship. We've got to separate, we've got to learn how to separate ourselves from those things. We're all aware of things that can compete with our attention. When we try to worship the Lord, you know, pastor this morning, I'm not saying you were a hindrance or anything, but how many of y'all started really getting hungry when he started emphasizing those steaks and that prime rib and all that food and everything? I don't know why. I saw a quote something the other day, something how during the invitation of church, your stomach decides to make a whale call. you know, because it's so hungry during that time, you know. Man, it's just, all of a sudden your mind just goes to food. Okay, invitation, come on, I'm hungry, you know. We start thinking about, it's amazing how many things can come between us and worshiping God so easily. Sometimes it's through relationships, you know, just different things that happen between people at church, people at home, people at work. All these things that can hinder us, the problems with the flesh. Problems with the mind, the problems out in the world. Folks, we've got to learn to banish those things, tell them to abide here, wherever, while we go yonder to worship. While we go yonder to worship. You know, Hebrews chapter 10, verse 21 to 22, it says, and having an high priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart and full assurance of faith. You know, we have a high priest. Amen. We have the privilege. It's one of the privileges of God's grace. And praise the Lord for it. We have been given a privilege. We've been given a responsibility. We're to draw near to him. How? With a true heart. You know, this is a call to approach the Lord with a heart that is focused wholly on him. You don't have to, you just think to yourself with this, when you came to church this morning, did you come with a heart that was focused only on God? Think about it. Or were there other things going through our minds? It's hard, isn't it? It's hard to keep those things out. It's hard to keep our minds from wondering, and especially when we've had a hard week at work, or something's going on at home, or this, that, or the other, it's hard to keep those things separate from our worship. From interfering with our worship. And I have some things here I wanted to just kind of give us an illustration, some things to kind of illustrate how we need to separate ourselves from things when we come to worship God. Now, we come to worship God at church, amen? We come to worship God when you have your devotions at home with the Lord. There's a lot of different times when we can come to worship God, but the idea that I want us to see here is that we need to separate ourselves from things that can distract us. I have a number of things here. Some of this is just my own personal opinion from my own personal experience. This thing right here is one of my biggest distractions. Am I alone? Can it distract you? It can't. There's a reason why it's illegal to hold a phone in your hand while you're driving down the road. Come on. Maybe we need to have invitation now. I don't know. It bothers me when I see people doing this and they have their knee on the steering wheel. We laugh, I know some of us are probably guilty of that. But what about when we have our morning devotions? You sit this right there when you're trying to read the Bible, this will be a hindrance. This can be a hindrance. In and of itself, it's not evil, but it can be a hindrance. Other things that can be a hindrance. Anything that distracts our mind, right? I'll just say money, finances, whether it's tithes and offerings, whether it's bills that we just don't know how they're gonna be, it distracts us from worshiping God. We can say things like that. It's empty, so don't try stealing it. There's some other things here. The planner book, our schedule. When you start getting down to try and worship God, reading the Bible or sitting in church, trying to worship the Lord, hearing the preaching of the word of God, it's amazing how you'll start thinking, you know what, Monday, I've got an appointment, this, that and the other. Tuesday, I've got a meeting at work, I need to be there early so I can do this and that. It's amazing how much this will distract us from worshiping God. You know what we need to say? Abide here, while I go yonder to worship. What else? This is the only thing I can find to represent vacation. We went to Puerto Rico last week. This is a necessity in your vacation to Puerto Rico. Okay, you don't use this, you will come back. Right, Tom? Pretty red, looking like a lobster, okay? But vacations, isn't it amazing how sometimes we go on vacation and the one thing that gets overlooked, where am I gonna go to church on Sunday? Or am I gonna go to church Wednesday? You know what? We'll come back from our vacation and realize all week long we haven't had our devotion. It distracted us, didn't it? It needs to abide here while we go yonder to worship. Other things. Sports, activity. And I'll put this together with it. And I'm stepping on my own shoes here. Hobbies. This is the most dangerous part, because the people involved in this have guns. These things can be a distraction. They can keep you from your worship of God. There's times where they need to hide here while I go yonder to worship. One more thing I have down here. It's kind of puzzling at first, but when we stop and think about it, this is a good book. It's written by Brother Fugate. It's called Church Growth Principles and Practices. I like this book. I've read it a couple times. Wonderful book. But you know what? Man wrote this book. This is God's Word. If I'm not careful, I can start trusting in man more than God. Now you can learn a lot from this. It can be a big help. But there's sometimes it can be a distraction. Well, he says this, but God says this. You know what? Sometimes we have to say, abide here, or I'll go yonder and worship. There's a lot of different things in our lives, and we can keep making a list and list and list of just different things that can distract us from day to day, from Sunday to Sunday, and we'll keep coming to church like we should. We'll keep standing up, singing the songs and praying and hearing the Word of God being preached and being faithful Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night, missions, conferences, revivals, but there's so many distractions in your life, you're not worshiping God with all that. We've got to learn, folks, that there's sometimes we need to stop and say, hey, listen, I've got things in my life that are distracting me. You need to stay over here so I can go yonder to worship. And you know what? It's kind of a sad thing, but when you're done worshiping, they'll still be there. They'll still be waiting on you. They're not going anywhere, are they? But you can worship God biblically in the way you should. And then you'll have more help to help you deal with those things. You'll be ready for it. For Abraham, the place of worship was not here. It wasn't with those two men and the helpers that he had there with him. They were gonna be a hindrance if they went any further. So he had to say, stay here, abide here, while me and my son go yonder to worship. Worship God. I'm going to worship if you're going to worship. We too must move from here yonder. You've got to do it. You've got to learn how to get rid of those distractions in your life. The only way we can do that is to separate our mind from anything that would hinder it from being totally given over to him. Go to Romans chapter 12, and you know this verse. We can probably quote it, but we're gonna read it. Romans chapter 12. You know where we're going. Look at verse two. I'm just gonna read verse two. We'll read verse one and two, because they go together. Chapter 12, verse one and two. It says, I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, wholly acceptable unto God, which is a reasonable service. Now look what it says here in verse two. and be not conformed to this world. All those things, and you know, not all of them are necessarily evil, but they're distractions. They are things that can keep us from God, if they're allowed to. It says, be not conformed to this world, but what? Be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. Folks, we've gotta learn in the renewing of our minds to, listen, we need to move from here to yonder where we can worship God. Tonight, think about it with this point. What occupies your mind when you came to worship this morning? What was occupying your mind? What occupies your mind tonight when you came back to church? What's had your attention this service? It is up here, we have, and even the choir, when they're up here, we have the advantage of looking out and just seeing everybody. And you can tell sometimes who's listening and who's not listening. Some folks, they're watching you and saying amen or shaking their heads and responding back and forth. Others, they're counting the ceiling tiles. It's amazing how the eyeballs follow the cell phone. You might have it hidden down here, but you're still doing this. Distractions. How have we been distracted today, just today, in our worship for the Lord? We've gotta learn to separate ourselves from those things. Leave them wherever you need to leave them, but don't bring them with you when you worship God. You leave them there. And you say, you stay here while I go yonder to worship. Very quickly, one more point here. I'd like to get through here tonight. Worship included, with Abraham's worship included self-denial. Self-denial. You know, and there in verse five again, go back to our text in Genesis chapter 22. There in our text in verse five, again, it says, and Abraham said to his young men, abide here with the ass and I and the lad will go yonder and worship and come again to you. Okay, Abraham told these young men he was going up to worship. He knew that it meant the sacrifice of his son. As far as Abraham knew, that's what was gonna happen. He knew it meant the sacrifice of his son. This was total self-denial for Abraham. When you stop and think, we've said it just a few minutes ago, who Isaac was to Abraham, it meant everything for him. Isaac was all of Abraham's hopes for the future of his family, for the promises of God. This was everything to Abraham. He yielded everything to God. to follow God's will. No regard for his own will. You think Abraham was going up that mountain with a heavy heart? Sure, but there was no regard for his feelings. He sacrificed all his opinions, all his desires, all his will, all his preferences, even his very future to the glory of God. He left it in the hands of God. You see, Abraham, and we've said this before, we're gonna say it several more times in the study of biblical worship, Abraham's worship was not about him. It was not about Abraham. It was all about God. That requires complete self-denial. Abraham did not seek to worship in a way that would allow him to be exalted. He worshiped in a way that brought all the glory to God. You can kind of say Abraham lost himself in the person of God. He denied himself completely. You know, us as believers, if we would worship, one thing we're gonna have to learn is to deny ourself. Deny ourself. Go with me to Philippians chapter three. Philippians chapter three. Philippians chapter three, and look in verse three. Philippians chapter three, verse three, it says, for we are the circumcision, look what it says here, which worship God in the spirit and rejoice in Christ Jesus. Look at this last part, and have no confidence where? In the flesh. It's not about us. It's all about Christ. If we would worship the Lord, then we must not come to him full of ourselves. You don't come and worship God saying, God, look what I've done. God, what can you do for me? God, I want this. God, I need this. Now we have our time in prayer to God to make our requests known. Amen. Praise the Lord. He's a good God in that. But when we're worshiping God, it's all about him, not us. We must come to him full of the very thing that delights God's heart. Now think back several times, but especially when Jesus was baptized and then the dove came down, what did God say? He said, this is my beloved son and what? Whom I am well pleased. Who does that tell you we need to fill ourselves with if we wanna please God? We need to fill ourselves with Christ. Focus on Him. God is infinitely delighted with His Son. If we will enter into His presence with a mind that is full, a mind and heart that is full of Christ, then God will accept our worship. God will rejoice in our worship. The Bible talks how that kind of worship is a sweet a sweet incense to him, a sweet smell. We're just simply reminding in this point here that worship, folks, worship is never about us. You've seen, I'm sure you've seen advertisements or maybe you've seen a church service before where they call it a worship service. But as far as I can tell, it's just the flesh being satisfied. That's it. It's nothing about God. It's about on how it makes me feel. I hear folks coming, some folks have said, you know, I just, I don't get anything out of it anymore. Well, it's not about you. It's about God. And if you would worship for the right reason, you would come away with a blessing from it. It's not about us. We can't worship as long as we're focused on ourselves. If we would worship the Lord, we must cease to exalt self. And we need to focus on exalting him and him alone. Real worship happens when we forget about ourselves and we get lost in his glory and for his glory. That's what biblical worship comes down to when we're talking about our self-denial, and we'll pick up next week. We'll stop here. Got a couple more points that we're gonna look at with Abraham's worship here on this, and sacrificing Isaac, all right? Let's all stand.