Sermon: Altar in the Wilderness

Today Pastor Choi talks about altar in the church.  3,500 years ago, in the wilderness, while their leader Moses was away, Aaron the priest succumbed to the demand from the people and created a golden calf.  That opened the floodgate of idolatry to Israel for the centuries to come and brought down God’s wrath on the future generations that culminated in the Babylonian Captivity.   Pastor exhorts the congregation to make a wise choice at Manahawkin UMC: worship the LORD God only for the sake of next generations.

 

     Altar in the Wilderness

 

 

 

Following is a summary of his sermon:
Altar in the wilderness

 

Acts 7:37-44   NASB

37This is the Moses who said to the sons of Israel, ‘God will raise up for you a prophet like me from your brethren.’38This is the one who was in the congregation in the wilderness together with the angel who was speaking to him on Mount Sinai, and who was with our fathers; and he received living oracles to pass on to you. 39Our fathers were unwilling to be obedient to him, but repudiated him and in their hearts turned back to Egypt, 40saying to Aaron, ‘Make for us gods who will go before us; for this Moses who led us out of the land of Egypt—we do not know what happened to him.’ 41At that time they made a calf and brought a sacrifice to the idol, and were rejoicing in the works of their hands. 42 But God turned away and delivered them up to serve the host of heaven; as it is written in the book of the prophets, ‘It was not to Me that you offered victims and sacrifices forty years in the wilderness, was it, O house of Israel? 43 You also took along the tabernacle of Moloch and the star of the god Rompha, the images which you made to worship. I also will remove you beyond Babylon.’  44 “Our fathers had the tabernacle of testimony in the wilderness, just as He who spoke to Moses directed him to make it according to the pattern which he had seen.

Introduction

I have been doing a sermon series on the “altar.”  I first talked about the individual altar.  All of us have an altar in our hearts built to someone/something we worship and serve.  Build one only to Me and pull down the altars of your idols, God commands us.

Then, I talked about the “family prayer altar.”  We as the family ought to have an altar dedicated only to God not to anything else or to anybody else.  With this altar, we declare to the world that we belong to the Lord God and that we worship/serve Him only.  Every day we gather around this family altar and pray together.  When the family prays together, they stay together.  I encourage you to take up the challenge of the family prayer altar for 30 days.  In fact, I am very pleased to announce that out of my goal of having 100 families, now the number is 51.  Forty nine to go and if you haven’t signed up yet, please do so today before you go home.  The sign-up sheet, daily check-list, and the directions of how to do it are on the table in the Narthex.

Contents

I am going to talk about the corporate altar this morning; the altar in the church.

Come and meet the pastor Moses.  You can’t ask for a better leader than him: He was a top-notch leader in every aspect.  First, academically, he was educated in the Egyptian palace as prince.  Next, for practical training in ministry, he spent forty years honing his skills as a shepherd.  Furthermore, look at his impressive references. For instance, for his personality, God vouched for him that Moses was the most humble man in the world: “Now the man Moses was very humble, more than any man who was on the face of the earth” (Numbers 12:3, NASB).

What about his accomplishments in ministry?  He was second to none.  God helped him to perform signs and wonders for 40 years (E.g. 10 plagues, parting of the Sea, manna).  God accompanied his congregation day and night: clouds to cover them from the Sun during the day and pillar of fire at night to keep them warm.   Moses directly spoke with God and received the living oracles from God and passed them onto the congregation of Israel.  His encounter with God was so supernatural that, after each meeting with God, his face would glow.  The people of Israel were afraid to see his face that he had to cover his face with a towel. “The sons of Israel would see the face of Moses, that the skin of Moses’ face shone. So Moses would replace the veil over his face until he went in to speak with Him” (Exodus 34:35, NASB).

He remained their faithful leader for 40 years until he died at the age of 120.

Let’s think about the congregation this time.  Moses’ congregation—the congregation of Israel—had over one million members!  The largest ever in human history!   It was huge.  There were problems and challenges galore.  Here’s one to begin with: there was an ongoing grumble against their leader Moses.  Why?   Because they loathed their journey to the Promised Land.  They hated what they were physically going through such as the same food for forty years (manna), scarce water, and harsh climate in the wilderness.  But, it was on the surface.

The real problem was this: their heart.  Their heart was never right with God.  They never liked what God was doing with them. They missed their old life-style in Egypt where they were slaves.  They missed it so much that they desired to go back.  They didn’t care if they became slaves again.  They preferred food over freedom.  To them, the freedom in the Promised Land wasn’t worth the hardships in the wilderness.  They wanted the old Egypt back.

In the Bible, Egypt means the world.  It is the world where we didn’t know God; where we didn’t know Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.  The world where we would worship idols and do whatever we desired without God; the world where we were slaves to sin and death.   Exodus means God’s action to bring His people, the Church, out of that world.  As we come out of the world, we become separated from the world.  Going through the Red Sea means baptism.  Baptism is the beginning of our life as a new creation in Christ.  The Wilderness means our life on earth as sojourners.  This world is not our permanent or true home.  The Promised Land means Heaven our eternal destination our true home.   The congregation in the wilderness is us as the believers who are separate from the world; the believers who are baptized for the forgiveness of sins through Jesus; the believers who travel through life’s challenges with endurance and with trust in God.  The believers who never turn their hearts back to the world but keep on pressing onto Heaven our eternal destination no matter how hard the journey is.

The fundamental issue is always the heart.  The hearts of the Israelites were not in God but always in the world where they used to live.  Their bodies were in the wilderness, yet their hearts never left Egypt.  They were least interested in God’s purpose and destination, and most interested in the comfort and pleasures of the world they left.  They would grumble against God and Moses wondering why they were brought out of Egypt into the wilderness: They said to Moses, “Is it because there were no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in the wilderness? Why have you dealt with us in this way, bringing us out of Egypt?” (Exodus 14:11).  Do you hear in every sentence “Egypt?”  They sure missed Egypt.

They desired Egypt and often tried to go back there.  Well, finally a chance arrived to rebel against their leader Moses and against God.  Moses wasn’t in the camp.  He had gone up into the mountains to receive the 10 commandments.  He didn’t come back in the same day.  He didn’t return the next day, either.  His absence became a week; a week turned into two weeks; the two weeks became 40 days.  After 40 days, they went to Aaron, Moses’ brother the second-in-command.  They asked him to create gods that would lead them back to Egypt.

Instead of rebuking them, Aaron succumbed to their demand.  He asked them to bring him gold.  With the collected gold, he created an image of a golden calf calling it god.   People rejoiced and brought their sacrifices to their idol and worshiped it.  That was the saddest day in the history of Israel because the congregation built an altar not to the Lord God but to the idols.  That was the day when idolatry sneaked in and never left from Israel.  Such idolatry continued in the Promised Land and beyond!  In fact, they worshiped idols and relentlessly provoked the Lord to anger for the next thousand years (Moses: 1,500 B.C.  The Babylonian Captivity: 586 B.C.).  Can anyone blame God who brought wrath upon the future generations—which culminated in the Babylonian Captivity?

The story of the golden calf is very poignant to God’s Church today: Do not build an altar in My church to idols.  Keep your heart with Me, God says.   He warns us this morning, “Remove idols in the church.  Do not turn back to the world and follow its lusts.”

In today’s church, the hearts of many believers are not with God but still in the world.  Many church attendees in America have already gone back to the world (or their hearts never left their spiritual Egypt, the world).  They have been backsliding.  Furthermore, what Aaron (who represents priests) did with the Israelites back then is still happening in the contemporary churches.  E.g.  Among the emerging and popular congregations many messages are crowd-pleasing rather than God-pleasing (Romans 2:29).  Many sermons focus on how to cope with life on earth but fail to equip the saints for eternal life.  Few promote Christ-like life-styles.  Many teach believers to seek the crown without the cross.   Resurrection without crucifixion.

Today people look for churches where preachers preach to their itching ears.  Listen to Paul the Apostle who said, “For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables” (2 Timothy 4:3-4 KJV).  The scariest thing is this:  when we prefer the world to God, when we love and practice the lusts of the world instead of God’s truth, God gives us over to our idols. “Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity” (Romans 1:24, 1:26, NASB).

The Lord asks us to repent today; both clergy and laity.

For clergy:  We must repent of our sins to please the crowd with sugar-coated messages.  Many a time, we succumb to the pressure from the crowd and end up preaching what they love to hear rather than the sound message of God’s Word.  We must repent of our sins of being a peddler of God’s Word (2 Corinthians 2:17).  We must repent of our sins of adulterating God’s Word (2 Corinthians 4:2).   We must stop preaching the prophecy of greed, flattery, and human glory (1 Thessalonians 2:4-6).   Pray for the clergy that they would be a faithful servant of God’s Word.  Pray that they would preach God’s Word without compromise.  Pray that they would be accurate handlers of God’s Word (2 Timothy 2:15).

As far as the laity is concerned, we must repent our sins of pressuring the clergy to preach only what we want to hear, not the wholesome truth of God’s Word.  We must repent our sins of loving the world and following its lusts.  Do not be conformed to the pattern of the world, God commands (Romans 12:1).   Listen to John the Apostle who said, “If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world” (1 John 2:15-16 KJV).

For us all, both clergy and laity, let us follow not the world, but God by renewing our hearts and minds daily (Romans 12:1-2).  Let us love the Lord with all our heart and soul and mind and strength (Mark 12:30).  Let us set our minds on things above, not on the things that are on earth (Colossians 3:2).  Let us live out a life worthy of God’s calling (2 Thessalonians 1:11).

Conclusion

               Think of one church: the congregation of Israel.  Think of one clergy: Aaron.  Think of one choice: idolatry.  If they both had resisted the temptation of worshiping idols, they could have avoided God’s wrath on their future generations.  The congregation could’ve chosen freedom over food sticking to the Lord their God.  Aaron could’ve chosen to please God instead of the people.  Neither of them did.  The result?  Centuries of idol worship ensued in Israel and God’s people suffered immensely for years.

Think of one congregation: Manahawkin.  Think of one clergy:  Kyewoon Choi.  Think of one choice we make together: The Lord God only.  The result?  God’s blessings on the next generations in our church.   Amen.              

Let’s pray.

Sermon: Family Prayer Altar

Pastor Choi challenges the congregation to join in Family Prayer Altar Challenge for the next five weeks (30 days except Sundays).  Taking the example of Gideon, he explains that God requires us to do two things before we go out into the world and make a difference.  Those two things are: Remove the idols in your life and build an altar to God (worship).

 

   Family Prayer Altar

 

Following is a summary of the sermon:

Family Prayer Altar

Judges 6:1-32   New Revised Standard Version (NRSV)

6 The Israelites did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, and the Lord gave them into the hand of Midian seven years. The hand of Midian prevailed over Israel; and because of Midian the Israelites provided for themselves hiding places in the mountains, caves and strongholds. For whenever the Israelites put in seed, the Midianites and the Amalekites and the people of the east would come up against them. They would encamp against them and destroy the produce of the land, as far as the neighborhood of Gaza, and leave no sustenance in Israel, and no sheep or ox or donkey. For they and their livestock would come up, and they would even bring their tents, as thick as locusts; neither they nor their camels could be counted; so they wasted the land as they came in. Thus Israel was greatly impoverished because of Midian; and the Israelites cried out to the Lord for help.

When the Israelites cried to the Lord on account of the Midianites, the Lord sent a prophet to the Israelites; and he said to them, “Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: I led you up from Egypt, and brought you out of the house of slavery; and I delivered you from the hand of the Egyptians, and from the hand of all who oppressed you, and drove them out before you, and gave you their land; 10 and I said to you, ‘I am the Lord your God; you shall not pay reverence to the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you live.’ But you have not given heed to my voice.”

11 Now the angel of the Lord came and sat under the oak at Ophrah, which belonged to Joash the Abiezrite, as his son Gideon was beating out wheat in the wine press, to hide it from the Midianites. 12 The angel of the Lord appeared to him and said to him, “The Lord is with you, you mighty warrior.” 13 Gideon answered him, “But sir, if the Lord is with us, why then has all this happened to us? And where are all his wonderful deeds that our ancestors recounted to us, saying, ‘Did not the Lord bring us up from Egypt?’ But now the Lord has cast us off, and given us into the hand of Midian.” 14 Then the Lord turned to him and said, “Go in this might of yours and deliver Israel from the hand of Midian; I hereby commission you.” 15 He responded, “But sir, how can I deliver Israel? My clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my family.” 16 The Lord said to him, “But I will be with you, and you shall strike down the Midianites, every one of them.” 17 Then he said to him, “If now I have found favor with you, then show me a sign that it is you who speak with me. 18 Do not depart from here until I come to you, and bring out my present, and set it before you.” And he said, “I will stay until you return.”

19 So Gideon went into his house and prepared a kid, and unleavened cakes from an ephah of flour; the meat he put in a basket, and the broth he put in a pot, and brought them to him under the oak and presented them. 20 The angel of God said to him, “Take the meat and the unleavened cakes, and put them on this rock, and pour out the broth.” And he did so. 21 Then the angel of the Lord reached out the tip of the staff that was in his hand, and touched the meat and the unleavened cakes; and fire sprang up from the rock and consumed the meat and the unleavened cakes; and the angel of the Lord vanished from his sight. 22 Then Gideon perceived that it was the angel of the Lord; and Gideon said, “Help me, Lord God! For I have seen the angel of the Lord face to face.” 23 But the Lord said to him, “Peace be to you; do not fear, you shall not die.” 24 Then Gideon built an altar there to the Lord, and called it, The Lord is peace. To this day it still stands at Ophrah, which belongs to the Abiezrites.

25 That night the Lord said to him, “Take your father’s bull, the second bull seven years old, and pull down the altar of Baal that belongs to your father, and cut down the sacred pole that is beside it; 26 and build an altar to the Lord your God on the top of the stronghold here, in proper order; then take the second bull, and offer it as a burnt offering with the wood of the sacred pole that you shall cut down.” 27 So Gideon took ten of his servants, and did as the Lord had told him; but because he was too afraid of his family and the townspeople to do it by day, he did it by night.

28 When the townspeople rose early in the morning, the altar of Baal was broken down, and the sacred pole beside it was cut down, and the second bull was offered on the altar that had been built. 29 So they said to one another, “Who has done this?” After searching and inquiring, they were told, “Gideon son of Joash did it.” 30 Then the townspeople said to Joash, “Bring out your son, so that he may die, for he has pulled down the altar of Baal and cut down the sacred pole beside it.” 31 But Joash said to all who were arrayed against him, “Will you contend for Baal? Or will you defend his cause? Whoever contends for him shall be put to death by morning. If he is a god, let him contend for himself, because his altar has been pulled down.” 32 Therefore on that day Gideon was called Jerubbaal, that is to say, “Let Baal contend against him,” because he pulled down his altar.

Introduction

Every one of us wants to make a difference in the world.  God says, “That’s wonderful, My child, go for it, but I want you to do things in proper order.  Do these things before you go out and start making a difference.”

We may ask, “What things?”  God says, “Remove the idols, worship Me, and change the world.”  That’s what I see in today’s story.  That’s the proper order of making a difference in the world.  Let me explain how I got that inspiration.

Contents

One day God’s angel appeared to Gideon and commissioned him to deliver his people from the enemies.  God said to him that He was with them.  Gideon said that if it were so, why did God’s people still suffer?  The LORD replied: because you guys abandoned Me.  Because you worship foreign gods instead: “I am the Lord your God; you shall not pay reverence to the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you live.’ But you have not given heed to my voice” (v. 10). 

Please notice here that God didn’t send Gideon right away into the battlefield to deliver Israel.

He required two things of him before changing the world.  What were they?  They were: remove the idols in your own house, worship Me, then go out and rescue My people.

Remember what I said last Sunday?  The revelation of God to His people always prompts them to build an altar to Him.  The same thing happened again here.  God appeared to Gideon, and Gideon built an altar to the LORD.

Something unusual in this picture, though.  Gideon built an altar twice to the LORD in one day.  Nowhere in the Bible was a man ever asked by God to build an altar twice a day.  But Gideon was.  In fact, he was the first and the last one who ever built twice an altar to the same God in one day.  It seems as if his first altar wasn’t good enough.

Think why God asked Gideon to build another altar after the first one in the same day.  Here’s why: because, right next to God’s altar that Gideon built, Baal’s altar was still standing and competing for Gideon’s loyalty.   It is like you dating your girlfriend and her ex-boyfriend is accompanying your date wherever you go.  You wish him to go away!

When it comes down to worship, our God doesn’t like competition.  He deserves and demands an exclusive loyalty from us to Him alone, not to any other gods/not to anybody else or anything else.  Even though Gideon built a genuine altar to the LORD first time, when God saw the altar of Baal still standing next to it, He said, “No way.  Get rid of it, Gideon!”

By the way, what was Baal?  It was one of the foreign gods in the land of Canaan.  It was a fertility god.  It was the rain god.  The meaning of the name is “lord, master, owner, or keeper.”  The people of Canaan worshiped it for centuries believing that it would bring blessings.  When the Israelites entered the land, God forbade them to worship Baal or any other gods in the land.  Yet, the people of Israel went after them.  Like the surrounding nations, they too wanted to worship this god of abundance.  Like the other people, they too loved the graven and molten image of Baal over no image of Jehovah God.

Let me read verses 25 and 26 one more time:  God said to Gideon,

“Pull down the altar of Baal that belongs to your father, and cut down the sacred pole that is beside it; 26 and build an altar to the Lord your God on the top of the stronghold here” (v. 25-26).   

Tear down the altar of Baal and build an altar to Me, God said.  Do it on top of the stronghold of the place where Baal’s altar used to be.  What is a stronghold?  It is a fortified place to protect people in it against attacks.   A castle.   A fortress.  It is built mainly for defense.  It provides a place of refuge (1 Samuel 23:19).

We must realize why God calls the altar of Baal a stronghold:  Once an altar is built, it becomes the place of refuge.   Whatever gods we build an altar to, they become our refuge and master.  E.g.  When you build an altar to money, it becomes your god and master.  When you build an altar to the LORD, He becomes your stronghold and refuge.  Gideon’s father built one to Baal and it became his idol and stronghold.  God wanted Gideon to remove it, repent of his father’s sin, and re-establish the covenant with Jehovah.

Why the family prayer altar?

This morning, I am launching a challenge of a family prayer altar to re-establish our relationship with God.  I urge every family in our congregation to remove their idols first and build a family altar on top of the stronghold of their idols.  At this altar, we give God access to our lives.  At this altar, we provide God with a stronghold and reign at our home.  Our family altar is the base for God to operate in our lives.   E.g.  Consider an altar like the American flag.  Imagine the American Flag flying at the White House, on Capitol Hill, and even in front of our church and our houses.  What does it signify?  It declares to everyone that America has reign over that territory and place.  We agree to live under its law and order.  The residents of the house where the flag is flying pledge their allegiance to America.

Same with our family prayer altar.  By dedicating our family prayer altar to the LORD, we fly the flag of allegiance to God’s sovereignty over our homes.  We welcome God to establish His kingdom and His stronghold in every family member’s life.  We also declare to our spiritual enemies that they have no business in our homes.  We ask them to look at our altar where God’s reign is firmly established; we tell them loud and clear that they are not welcome in our homes, in fact, we are at spiritual war against them.  As we defend our family altar, we defend God’s reign in our homes.  At the family prayer altar, we also invoke God’s help, provision, and protection.

That’s what the family prayer altar is all about.

What Are the Benefits of the Family Prayer Altar?

  1. Repentance and forgiveness of our sins.
  2. Peace and harmony in our home so that we may as a family hear the voice of God (Lydia Prince).  The peace between husband and wife also trickles down to our children.
  3. Family dialogue replacing TV, smart phones, and other things that deprive the family of quality time.
  4. Train our children on behalf of our society.  At the altar, the family stays strong in the Lord.  Families that pray together stay together.  We build up our children strong before they go out into the world.  “Victorious warriors win first and then go to war, while defeated warriors go to war and then seek to win” (Sun-Tzu).  God prepared Gideon first before He sent him out to the battlefield.  Likewise, God will prepare our children at the family altar before they go out into the world.

How-to?

  1. Daily: repeated sin offerings were necessary in the temple of God.   We do it every day except Sundays, because we already worship the Lord at church.
  2. 10 minutes max
  3. Demonstration with the help of Prayer Group
    1. Sharing.  How was your day?
    2. Scripture (Gospel, Psalms, Proverbs) and Praise
    3. Prayer.  Everyone participates.
    4. Lord’s Prayer

Conclusion

It is time to wake up from our spiritual slumber.  God calls you and your family to the prayer altar!  I am looking for 100 families.  Our church has three hundred families.  We can have at least 100 families who would build their family prayer altar to the LORD daily.  Please sign up today and start praying for your family and for our community and society!  Amen.

 

 

 

 

 

Sermon: Isaac the man of maturity, peace, and altar

Today Pastor Choi remembers Isaac—son of Abraham— as the man of maturity, peace, and altar.  Isaac was wise and mature, because he practiced his strength under control despite the temptations to strike back against his enemies.   The LORD blessed him for his peaceful approach to conflicts.  Isaac also built an altar to God to worship the LORD only.

    Isaac the man of maturity, peace, and altar

 

 

Following is a summary of the sermon:

Isaac: the man of maturity, peace, and altar

Genesis 26:12-33New American Standard Bible (NASB)

12 Now Isaac sowed in that land and reaped in the same year a hundredfold. And the Lord blessed him, 13 and the man became rich, and continued to grow richer until he became very wealthy; 14 for he had possessions of flocks and herds and a great household, so that the Philistines envied him. 15 Now all the wells which his father’s servants had dug in the days of Abraham his father, the Philistines stopped up by filling them with earth. 16 Then Abimelech said to Isaac, “Go away from us, for you are too powerful for us.” 17 And Isaac departed from there and camped in the valley of Gerar, and settled there.

Quarrel over the Wells

18 Then Isaac dug again the wells of water which had been dug in the days of his father Abraham, for the Philistines had stopped them up after the death of Abraham; and he gave them the same names which his father had given them. 19 But when Isaac’s servants dug in the valley and found there a well of flowing water, 20 the herdsmen of Gerar quarreled with the herdsmen of Isaac, saying, “The water is ours!” So he named the well Esek, because they contended with him. 21 Then they dug another well, and they quarreled over it too, so he named it Sitnah. 22 He moved away from there and dug another well, and they did not quarrel over it; so he named it Rehoboth, for he said, “At last the Lord has made room for us, and we will be fruitful in the land.”

23 Then he went up from there to Beersheba. 24 The Lord appeared to him the same night and said,

“I am the God of your father Abraham;
Do not fear, for I am with you.
I will bless you, and multiply your descendants,
For the sake of My servant Abraham.”

25 So he built an altar there and called upon the name of the Lord, and pitched his tent there; and there Isaac’s servants dug a well.

Covenant with Abimelech

26 Then Abimelech came to him from Gerar with his adviser Ahuzzath and Phicol the commander of his army. 27 Isaac said to them, “Why have you come to me, since you hate me and have sent me away from you?” 28 They said, “We see plainly that the Lord has been with you; so we said, ‘Let there now be an oath between us, even between you and us, and let us make a covenant with you, 29 that you will do us no harm, just as we have not touched you and have done to you nothing but good and have sent you away in peace. You are now the blessed of the Lord.’” 30 Then he made them a feast, and they ate and drank. 31 In the morning they arose early and exchanged oaths; then Isaac sent them away and they departed from him in peace. 32 Now it came about on the same day, that Isaac’s servants came in and told him about the well which they had dug, and said to him, “We have found water.” 33 So he called it Shibah; therefore the name of the city is Beersheba to this day.

Introduction

I love the book of Genesis in the Bible.  I love it, not only because it is God’s Word, but also because it has plenty of real life stories of real people that I can relate to: Adam and Eve, Cain, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph and many more.  In the past couple of months, I spoke about Adam and Eve’s temptations.  I talked about Noah and his preparation for God’s judgment.  I also spoke about Abraham twice already (lies and generosity).

The same Abraham got his son Isaac when he was 100 years old.  Isaac was the miracle baby, the promise child, and the “laugh” child (the meaning of ‘Isaac’).  Isaac’s birth taught Abraham and his wife a lesson: the lesson to believe that nothing is impossible with God.  Because of his unwavering faith in God, Abraham was considered righteous before God.  Today’s sermon is about that blessed child of Abraham—the next generation of faith in God.

Contents

How would I remember Isaac in the Bible?   In today’s terms, he was an entrepreneur.  Truly a successful business man was he!  Did you know that he was engaged in three different types of business: shepherding, digging wells, and even farming?  He was not a farmer, yet, one year he ventured into farming; he sowed seed in the land, and in the same year he reaped a hundredfold (v. 12).  A hundredfold return in a year!  That would be any farmer’s dream!  Any investor’s (any hedge fund manager’s) dream!   Whatever he did, he flourished.

That’s the business side.  As far as his life as a person, three things stand out in today’s text.  He was the man of maturity, the man of peace, and the man of altar.

  1. The man of maturity

Isaac, on the outside, was a mild mannered man, yet inside he was mature, prudent, and strong.  I also believe that digging wells shaped him into a man of maturity.   You may wonder: how in the world well-digging has anything to do with his wisdom and maturity.   Let me explain.  I have to begin with his father Abraham.   Abraham passed away at the age of 175 (Genesis 25:7).  Isaac became the head of his household when he was 75 years old.  Throughout his life, he dug several wells (v. 18, 21, 22, 25, and 32).

Last week, I explained to you that digging a well in the land of Canaan—the wilderness—was not a small task.  Many a time the wells had to be dug at least 100-foot deep.  It involved many men and days to dig one.  Isaac did it several times.  Most of the time, he did so, not by choice, but rather he was forced to.  Originally, he inherited the wells that his father had dug.  However, as you read in today’s story, his neighbors were not kind.  In fact, they were very hostile to him, because they were very envious of his success and his wealth.  Compared to their well-being, Isaac the foreigner was filthy rich.  So, you know what they did to him?   They went to Isaac’s wells and filled them up with dirt.  They went to another well that also belonged to Isaac and claimed it was theirs, although they never lifted a finger to dig it.  Talking about persecution of Jews for no reasons—such anti-Semitism has been around thousands of years.

  1. The man of peace

What impressed me is this: whenever the locals disputed Isaac’s right to the wells, he didn’t contest.  He just gave up and moved to a different place and dug a new well.  Four times he did so in today’s story alone.  You see, when things happen, we can tell what kind of people we are by looking at how we handle the situations.  I like Isaac’s approach here: he didn’t fight back.  Each time the locals harassed him and stopped up or confiscated his wells, he kept moving on and avoided confrontations.

Mind you that he was not a wimp at all. On the contrary, he surely had a power to fight back for his own rights and win, too.  Did you know that Isaac had his own army ready to fight any battles?  To begin with, he inherited a private army from his father.  Remember this: Abraham defeated the armies of five kings with his own army of 318 men, all born and trained in his house (Genesis 14:14).   On top of his father’s men, Isaac must have had hundreds more men who were capable of bearing the sword.  Look at today’s text.  He was very powerful in the eyes of enemies (Genesis 26:16) to the point where King Abimelech (the king in the region) came to him at his own will to cut a peace treaty with Isaac (Genesis 26:31).  You see, Abimelech realized that Isaac was a powerhouse in the region that he wanted to keep peace with him.

Despite all his military strength as such, Isaac chose not to strike back when he was wronged repeatedly.  He practiced strength under control.  I think it was a smart move.  I believe he was prudent.  He was a man of peace.  Had there been the Nobel Peace Prize back then, he would have won it.  War seems a good choice at times, but pursuing peace brings forth the best result in the end.  You want a proof?   Isaac thrived more than ever.  Look at verses 12 and 13:  “12 …the Lord blessed him, 13 and the man became rich, and continued to grow richer until he became very wealthy;” (Genesis 26:12-13).

  1. The man of altar

Here’s another thing that deserves our attention: Isaac built an altar to the LORD.  I am talking about something very significant here.  In fact, this is far more important than being mature and keeping peace with neighbors.  Look at verse 23 where God appeared to Isaac.  He assured him that He would bless and multiply his descendants as He promised to Abraham.  Then, look at verse 25.  In response, Isaac built an altar to God and called upon the name of the LORD (v. 25).  God appears to God’s people and they build an altar to God.  In fact, this is a pattern repeated over and over in the Bible: Noah was the first person in the Bible who built an altar to God after the Great Flood.  Abraham followed suit (he built an altar at four different places), followed by Isaac, and followed by Jacob.  And centuries later Moses built an altar twice to God.  King Saul, King David, King Solomon did the same.  So did the Prophets.

Think with me one more time about altar.  What’s the purpose of altar?  What’s the significance of altar?  It’s not a nice piece of furniture in the sanctuary for decorations.  Rather, altar is the place where we meet God.  God initiates the meeting and people of God meet Him at the altar.  He reveals Himself and invites us to a relationship—the covenant relationship—at the altar.  We respond to God’s invitation with allegiance and gratitude at the altar.  At the altar we offer sacrifices (typically burnt offerings), because they were pleasing to the LORD (Genesis 8:21).  All these revelations of God and all our responses to Him take place at the altar.

Let me repeat what I said: altar is a place of covenant.  Altar is the witness between the two parties in covenant: God and us (Acts 7:44).  Altar is where God is present.  It is a holy ground because God is there (Acts 7:34).  Altar is where our heart is.  God meets us there and proclaims Himself who He is to us.  He is the Almighty and God WHO I AM.   He also sets the terms of our relationship with Him: He is our King and Lord.  He is our Provider and Protector.  He is our Refuge.  He is our Comforter.  He is our Peace.  He is our Shield.  He is our Strength.  He would be all of these for us as long as we stay loyal to Him.  He would do all of these in exchange of one thing: Worship Him only, no other gods.  With trust and confidence, we accept these terms.  We pledge our allegiance to Him and express our gratitude through offerings.  All of these take place at the altar.

Conclusion

In our hearts, everyone builds and has an altar.  To whom is your altar dedicated?  Too many people build altars to their idols and worship them (money, power, lust, desires, etc.).  However, God’s people build an altar only to Him; to no one or to nothing else.  Let us build an altar to God for daily worship and prayer.  Let us build an altar where we present our bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is our spiritual worship (Romans 12:1).   Next week, I will talk more about altar: this time, family prayer altar.  Don’t miss it.

Let’s bow our heads and pray.