Don't hold a candle to the infinite joy and pleasure of knowing You and being in Your presence. God, I pray this morning, come and meet with us. Give us a taste of Your presence this morning. Even as we have sung and now as we open Your Word to study it together and to hear from You, I pray that You will make Yourself known to us. You are God Almighty and I pray that You will reveal Yourself to us this morning in ways that will change us. It's in Jesus' name we pray and for His glory. Amen. What you believe about God is the most important thing in your life. Your view of God will shape you and shape your life, influence you more profoundly than any other belief that you hold. I saw this illustrated this week and thought about this week. Just this past Wednesday, we had the opportunity to set up a booth at Carnegie Mellon University at their Activities Fair for the beginning of the year and were able to talk with many different students. Some students were looking for a church or looking for some kind of Christian organization. Many other students were not. But we're still willing to talk and talk about spiritual things. A couple students were atheists, and we talked about evolution and different things like that. One student was a Hindu. One young lady said, I'm a pagan. I believe in polytheism. One young man was just totally apathetic to spiritual things, and he said, you know, there's God and there's me and everything's okay. And we talked about that. But he didn't feel like he had time in life to really even think about religious things or spiritual things. And as I thought about those conversations, I thought about how much their lives are shaped and will be shaped by their view of God, what they believe about God. Just think about how you would view the world, for instance, if you didn't believe that God even existed. How would you think about life? How would you think about the purpose of life? How would you think about trials in life? How would you interpret all of those things if you just felt like, just kind of an accident here, the result of random chance. Or if you believe, as a Hindu, that there are millions of different deities. Or if you believe that who God is doesn't really matter. I mean, that doesn't really have any bearing on my life here and now, so I'm just going to live on. Even if I think He does exist, I'm going to live as though He doesn't. How would those different viewpoints affect your view of life, your response to trials in life? How would it affect your morality? How would it affect your hope and your joy in life? Who is God? Who is God? What do you believe about God? Do you know the God of the universe, the God who has revealed Himself to us in Scripture, in this book, in the Bible? He is the true God. He is the only true God. And knowing Him is the only way to experience true life and true hope, true peace, true contentment, true joy. Well, this morning we're going to be looking at Genesis 17. And I begin in this way because the first point I want to make is God Almighty is our God. In the first eight verses of Genesis 17, we see something of who God is and what He can do as God Almighty. So I want to begin by reading the first eight verses of Genesis 17 and then talking about how our knowledge of this God, how our understanding of the true God will and should encourage us and change our lives. So Genesis 17. verses 1-8. When Abram was 99 years old, the Lord appeared to Abram and said to him, I am God Almighty. Walk before me and be blameless that I may make my covenant between me and you and may multiply you greatly. Then Abram fell on his face and God said to him, Behold, my covenant is with you and you shall be the father of a multitude of nations. No longer shall your name be called Abram, but your name shall be Abraham, for I have made you the father of a multitude of nations. I will make you exceedingly fruitful, and I will make you into nations, and kings shall come from you. And I will establish my covenant between me and you and your offspring after you throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant to be God to you and to your offspring after you." And I will give to you and to your offspring after you the land of your sojournings, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession. And I will be their God. Verse 1 begins here by updating us on Abram's age. He is now 99, which means that 13 years have now passed since the end of chapter 16 where he was 86. If you look back to the last verse in chapter 16, it says that he was 86 years old when Hagar bore Ishmael to Abram. So, here 13 years later, We come to these events in chapter 17. Ishmael now is 13 years old. Abram and Sarai are 13 years older. Sarai, who has always been barren, she has not been able to bear children, she's now even further beyond childbearing age. And everyone assumes that Ishmael is it. Ishmael is going to be the heir. That's the assumption. Well, this is the state of affairs in Abram's household when the Lord appears to him. We read in verse 1 that God begins, as He reveals Himself, He begins by identifying Himself as God Almighty. El Shaddai. Last week in chapter 16, we saw that Hagar referred to God as El Roy, the God of seeing. Well, here is another name of God that we encounter. And here for the first time, El Shaddai, God Almighty. God is about to announce to Abram this amazing promise. And He begins by naming Himself as God Almighty. I am God Almighty. The All-Sufficient One. El Shaddai. Let me ask you again, what do you believe about God? Do you believe that God is God Almighty? Do you believe that He is El Shaddai? Do you believe that He is sitting on the throne of the universe, controlling all things, able to keep all of His promises, able to do whatever He wants to do, able to fulfill all His will? Is God all-powerful? Is God El Shaddai? Or to you, is God just a God who cannot control all things? Some things kind of slip out of His sphere of influence. Is He a God who does not know all things? Is He a God who can't quite accomplish all of His will? He's trying, but He can't quite do it. In the Bible, God reveals Himself as God Almighty. And I find great comfort in this truth about God, that He is God Almighty. If God is not Almighty, if He's not all-powerful, then where could we find hope? Where would we go for hope in life, in the hard times? We might try to muster some false hope in our own abilities, in our own strength, but that deep, unshakable, Joy and hope that we all long for is only possible when we understand that God is almighty and powerful. He is the all-sufficient One. He is El Shaddai. In verse 3, Abram responds by falling on his face before God. Later in the chapter, as we'll see, he falls on his face again with a very different attitude in his heart. But here, Abram prostrates himself before the Lord out of reverence and awe. He is in awe of who God is. This is an act of worship. This is worship that we see here. Put yourself in Abram's place for a moment. If the Lord appeared to you and announced, I am God Almighty, I think I would fall on my face as well. That would be an awesome thing to behold. You know, God has never appeared to me in that way, but He has revealed Himself to me and to all of us in this book. Right? God has revealed Himself to us in His Word, in Scripture. And I think Abram's action here that we see of Him falling on His face before the Lord in the presence of the Lord. That is an example for us of true worship. In the presence of God Almighty, He falls on His face. He bows down humbly before God Almighty in awe of God's majesty and God's power and God's presence. We need to have times like this on a regular basis. Is that true in your life? Is that happening in your life? Are you striving for that in your life? To have these kinds of times of worship in the presence of God? He is revealing Himself to us in His Word. We need to go to His Word. We need to commune with Him and we need to stand in awe and wonder of who He is. Don't read the Bible to check off a box. Don't read the Bible just to gather some historical data. Don't read the Bible even to just dot the i's in your theological system. But read the Bible as God's revelation of Himself to us and stand in awe of Him. Stand in awe of Him. Bow down before the Lord and worship Him. Delight in the beauty of who He is. Behold His beauty. in the Scriptures as you read what He has done and how He has revealed Himself to mankind. May that kind of authentic worship characterize our lives. Because when that happens, God is glorified and we find true joy. That's the only way that we as human beings can find true joy. We won't have to wander through life aimlessly, wondering, who am I? Why am I here? What's my purpose in life? How do I find pleasure? Once we see God for who He is, once we behold His glory, then everything else in life will come together and fit together in relation to Him. Well, moving on, God speaks again in verses 4-8, and one of the things He does there is change Abram's name. The name Abram meant exalted father. But God now changes His name to Abraham, which means father of a multitude. He was Abram, exalted father, and God changes his name to Abraham, father of a multitude. Now, there are a couple of interesting things to see here. First of all, we should notice that God has the right of naming His people. In this chapter, He changes Abram's name to Abraham. He changes Sarai's name to Sarah. And He also instructs that their son's name will be Isaac. God has this right to do this as the Almighty God, as the sovereign ruler of the universe. He has the right to name His people. Imagine if you went to work one day and your boss said, your name will no longer be Mike, it will be Steve. Or your name will no longer be Julie, it will be Susan. I don't think any of us would agree to that, right? Because no boss has the right to change our names. But God, has that right. God has the right to change names. He has the right to name His people. And God exercises that right here with Abram and Sarai. He changes their names to Abraham and Sarah as a way of indicating that He's doing something new here. He's going to fulfill the promise. Everything is changing. The second thing to notice is the meaning of the name Abraham. It means father of a multitude. So, in the Hebrew language, every time someone said, Abraham, they were saying, father of a multitude. Every time Sarah spoke his name, every time his friends called him by name, they called him, father of a multitude. Good morning, father of a multitude. How are you feeling, father of a multitude? It's time for dinner, father of a multitude." Dozens of times a day, Abraham and those around him were reminded of God's amazing and unbelievable plan that he was going to be the father of a multitude. And I say unbelievable because at this point, Abraham still only had one son, Ishmael. He had one son. He wasn't exactly the father of a multitude. He was the father of one son, and that son wasn't even born by his own wife, but by his wife's servant, Hagar. So, by name, Abraham was father of a multitude, but in physical reality, at least at this moment in time, he was only the father of one. Look at what God says in verse 5. No longer shall your name be called Abram, but your name shall be Abraham, for I have made you the father of a multitude of nations." He's not only the father of a multitude, but the father of a multitude of nations. What a promise this is. And it is a sure promise. God states it as though it has already been fulfilled. I have made you the father of a multitude of nations. When God chooses to do something and when He promises to do it, it is as good as done. He says it, it's going to happen. I have made you the Father of a multitude of nations. Nothing can thwart God's plans because He is God Almighty. When we look at Abraham's descendants, we see that various nations did come through his offspring. But the real significance of this The real significance of this promise is in the spiritual offspring of Abraham. Abraham's spiritual offspring will one day, Revelation 5-9 tells us this, will one day include individuals from every tribe and language and people and nation. Every nation. Every ethnic group. There will be individuals whom God saves because God is redeeming people for Himself from every tribe and language and people and nation. And the New Testament tells us that everyone who believes in Christ, everyone who is a Christian, everyone who is a believer, is a true descendant of Abraham. It doesn't matter if you can trace your bloodline back to Abraham. It's are you believing in Christ? The seed of Abraham. Are you in Christ? And if you are believing in Christ, if you are in Christ, then you are a descendant of Abraham. You are one of his offspring. Now, do you know what that means as we read this passage? It means that if you're trusting in Christ, you are included in this promise to Abraham's offspring. It is an awesome promise. Words, as I read them again in verses 7 and 8. Let these words soak into your mind and your soul. God says to Abraham, and I will establish My covenant between Me and you and your offspring after you. That's us as believers in Christ. Throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant to be God to you and to your offspring after you. and I will give to you and to your offspring after you the land of your sojournings, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession, and I will be their God." I will be their God. If you are a Christian, if you're trusting in Christ, and therefore a true descendant of Abraham, then God is speaking to you in this passage and He is saying, I will be your God. God Almighty. has made an everlasting covenant, an eternal covenant to be our God. To be God to you and to your offspring after you. Verse 7. I will be their God. Verse 8. The Almighty, All-Sufficient, Omnipotent God is pleased to be our God. That means that He is committed to using His infinite power for our good. The strength and the might of El Shaddai is flowing toward us in order to bless us. Not because we deserve blessing. We don't deserve this. Rather, in spite of the fact that we deserve wrath, we deserve God's punishment, in spite of that, it pleases God to channel His grace into our lives. Ponder the fact that God Almighty is our God. He has established a covenant, an eternal covenant to be our God. He has promised to give us the land as an everlasting possession. This points to our inheritance of eternal life in heaven. We will enjoy the new heavens and new earth for unending ages, basking in the glory and the beauty of who God is. Brothers and sisters, meditate on these things. Meditate on this truth that the Almighty God is our God. He is for us. And since He is for us, who can be against us? May we know the power and the love and the grace and mercy and justice and righteousness and holiness and goodness and kindness and patience of our God. And our knowledge of God as we know Him better and better through His Word, our knowledge of God will shape us more profoundly than anything else in life. Our knowledge of God will change us and shape us. Our knowledge of God will give us rock-solid hope in the midst of trials. And will give us life-giving joy and peace as we face the days ahead. So know the God of this book. He is our God. That was the first point I wanted to make. God Almighty is our God. Next, I want us to see how God marks us as His own. God marks us as His own. Let me read verses 9-19. And God said to Abraham, as for you, you shall keep My covenant, you and your offspring after you throughout their generations. This is My covenant which you shall keep. between Me and you and your offspring after you. Every male among you shall be circumcised. You shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskins, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between Me and you. He who is eight days old among you shall be circumcised. Every male throughout your generations, whether born in your house or bought with your money from any foreigner who is not of your offspring, both he who is born in your house and he who is bought with your money, shall surely be circumcised. So shall my covenant be in your flesh an everlasting covenant. And then listen to this warning in verse 14. Any uncircumcised male who is not circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin shall be cut off from his people. He has broken my covenant. And God said to Abraham, as for Sarah, your wife, you shall not call her name Sarah, but Sarah shall be her name. I will bless her and moreover, I will give you a son by her. I will bless her and she shall become nations. Kings of peoples shall come from her." Then Abram fell on his face and laughed and said to himself, shall a child be born to a man who is a hundred years old? Shall Sarah who is ninety years old bear a child?" This is just like Zechariah's response that we saw on Sunday School this morning in Luke 1. Shall Sarah, who is 90 years old, bear a son?" Verse 18, "'And Abraham said to God, O that Ishmael might live before you.'" Abraham's vision was so small. He had God in a box. He wanted Ishmael to be the heir. He couldn't envision anything greater than that. But God said, no. "'But Sarah, your wife, shall bear you a son, and you shall call his name Isaac.'" I will establish my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his offspring after him." Well, in Genesis 17, God gives Abraham a sign of the covenant. And the sign of this covenant is circumcision. Now, think back. Do you remember God's covenant with Noah in Genesis 9? Do you remember how God promised Noah that He would never flood the earth again to destroy it? And do you remember the sign that God gave to Noah as a sign of that covenant? It was the rainbow. Later in the New Testament, we see in the covenant that God made with Moses, we see another sign. The sign of that covenant is the Sabbath. So we see these different signs that are connected to different covenants. In this particular case, in the case of God's covenant with Abraham, the sign is circumcision. We already saw in Genesis 15 that God has established His covenant with Abraham, and it's now in chapter 17 that He instructs Abraham concerning a sign for this covenant. a sign that will mark him and mark his descendants after him as God's people. The sign of circumcision is a way that God marks his people as his own. In verse 11, God says, you shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskins and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you. Then he gives instructions for how this should be carried out among all the males in his household. And later in the chapter, we see that Abraham obeyed immediately. It says that very day in verse 23. And then it's repeated in verse 26, that very day Abraham and his son Ishmael were circumcised and all the men of his house. So, this removal of foreskin was a permanent mark by which God marked His people as His own. Well, the question that comes to mind at this point is, well, why this sign? Isn't this an odd sign to give as a sign of God's covenant? with Abraham. I mean, we look at these other signs, the rainbow. I mean, that's a pretty sign, right? The Sabbath. That's a nice thing. But circumcision. Why circumcision? What an odd sign for God to give to His people. If God wanted to mark His people, couldn't He have thought of some other way? I mean, couldn't they have tattooed Yahweh on their shoulder or something like that? God could have Marked his people in so many other ways. Why circumcision? Well, in a moment, I want to look at a couple other verses in the Old Testament and also a verse in the New Testament that show the deeper meaning of circumcision and what circumcision pointed to. But before we get there, I want us to look at Genesis 17 and think about why God would ordain this particular sign as the sign of His covenant with Abraham. God has already changed Abram's name to Abraham. Father of a multitude. And He's promised him, I have made you the father of a multitude of nations. And then in verse 16, God promises, I will give you a son by Sarah. Even in their old age, they're going to receive a son. This is the biggest surprise of the whole thing. Abraham was still assuming that this promise would be fulfilled through Ishmael, but now God tells him that Sarah will have a son. Abraham's so surprised, as we read, that he falls on his face and he laughs. To him, this promise was literally unbelievable. He's 100 years old. His wife is 90 years old. It's laughable. All he can do is laugh at God's Well, the point I want to make is that all of this, all of this, including the sign of circumcision, is part of God's plan to highlight His own power and His greatness and to demonstrate Abraham's utter dependence on God. the sign of circumcision, this mark on the male organ of procreation, is another way that Abraham is constantly reminded of God's grace and God's power to keep His promises. It's not because of Abraham's sexual virility or his manliness that Isaac is going to be born. It's because of God's promise. This is all of God. God promises and God fulfills His promises. He doesn't need us. He does it in spite of us. So in spite of all of Abraham's limitations, God keeps His promise. It's not by our initiative. Not by our effort. It's not according to the flesh. But it's God's grace. So God uses this particular sign, this mark of circumcision to continually remind Abraham and Abraham's descendants, God is the one who keeps the promises. In Deuteronomy, God's Word gives some further revelation about circumcision and shows that it is not just about the removal of physical foreskin. In Deuteronomy 10.16, Moses instructs the Israelites, circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart and be no longer stubborn. Circumcise therefore the foreskin of your heart. You see, the outward sign of circumcision is just a pointer. to something much more significant. It's a pointer to an inward, a spiritual reality. The flesh of our hearts must be cut away. Our hearts must be circumcised. And then later in Deuteronomy, in Deuteronomy 30, verse 6, we're told that God will perform this heart circumcision. and the Lord your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your offspring so that you will love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul that you may live." That's a great promise in Deuteronomy 30. Before this heart circumcision happened, All of us were in bondage to the flesh. We loved the things of this world and only the things of this world. We lust after power and money and sex and comfort. And before God regenerated us, before God saved us, that's all that was happening in our hearts. Those are the only desires that we had. But when God acts and when He circumcises our hearts, when He cuts away that flesh and removes the foreskin of our hearts, then we are new creatures in Christ. We're new and we have new desires, new wants. Then we can see that God is so much more satisfying than All these other things. So much more satisfying than power and money and sex and comfort. In order for any person to have spiritual life, this heart operation must take place. This heart circumcision must take place. And this is something that only God can do. Only God can perform this heart surgery. He is the one who has to cut away that flesh that enslaves us, and He has to give us new desires for Him. But let me ask you this morning, has God circumcised your heart? Has this operation taken place in your soul, in your being? If God has circumcised your heart, it is a way that He has marked you as His own. And if that circumcision has happened, then it will be unmistakable because your desires will be different. You'll want different things. Your choices will be different. Your actions will be different. The way you spend your time will be different. The way you spend your money will be different. This is not to say that all the old desires are all of a sudden gone and have disappeared. I wish I could say that was the case. The old desires linger on, but now there are these new desires that slowly begin to triumph over the old ones. If God has circumcised your heart, then you are marked eternally as one of God's children, as one of God's elect, as one of the redeemed. I want to close with one verse from the New Testament that highlights an aspect of circumcision by showing the connection between circumcision and the death of Christ. The verse is Colossians 2.11. And it says, in Him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands. Now what could that be? A circumcision made without hands. That's spiritual circumcision. That's circumcision of the heart that Paul is referring to here. Circumcision made without hands. It's not the physical circumcision. It's spiritual circumcision. So, in him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands by putting off the body of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ. The circumcision of Christ. And that is referring to Christ's death on the cross. The circumcision of Christ. Christ's death on the cross. His physical body was put to death. The putting off of the body of the flesh. That's what happened to Christ on the cross. His physical body was put to death. Christ was cut off. Back in Genesis 17, there was a severe warning to those who were not circumcised. As I read in verse 14, it says, any uncircumcised male who is not circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin shall be cut off from his people. He has broken my covenant. So in God's covenant with Abraham, either you were cut in circumcision or you were cut off from the people because you were a covenant breaker. Here's the significance in the cross of Christ. Every single one of us We are all covenant breakers. Nobody here has kept the covenant. None of us have loved God as we ought to. We've loved other things. We've turned away from God. All we've done on our own is break the covenant. That's what we do. We're covenant breakers. And we deserve God's punishment. We deserve to be cut off from the covenant because of what we have done, because of our sin. But what did Christ do? Christ was cut off for us. He was cut away. He was circumcised. He was killed for us. He received the curse of the covenant so that we can receive the blessings of the covenant. This is good news, brothers and sisters. This is the gospel. Christ was cut off so that we can receive the blessings of the covenant. So, remember from Genesis 17, God Almighty is our God. The Almighty God of the universe. He is for us. His infinite power is flowing to us for our good. God Almighty is our God. And God marks us as His own by circumcising our hearts. And that circumcision is only possible because of the circumcision of Christ. His death on the cross. Let's pray. God, we praise You this morning that You sent Your beloved Son, Jesus Christ, to live a perfect life here in this fallen world, and then to die on the cross. He is the one Person who kept the covenant. He is the one Person who did not deserve to be cut off, and yet He was cut off so that sinners like us can be saved. We praise You, God. We stand in awe of You. We worship You because of this good news. Amen.