All right, well it is good to be with you. I invite you to take your Bibles this morning and turn to Genesis chapter 11. Genesis 11, and we are going to see a testament to God's grace on display in our passage this morning. 

We're used to that week by week. It's been such a thrill to be in Genesis and see in particular the character of God and His intervention, frankly, in the darkness of humanity. There's a theme over and over that we keep seeing. 

It's our desperate need and our moral corruption and our hopeless state and then God's righteousness and also His grace and His mercy. As we get into Genesis 11 this morning, I want you to think of the Arabian Peninsula, okay, the Persian Gulf region. It is a long time ago. 

It's about 4,000 years ago. It's a somewhat desolate place and when you think of that region, what I want you to imagine is a very dark spiritual place, a region that is post-Babel but humanity really hasn't learned its lesson yet. And so there's been a theme that we've seen over and over is post-Garden what happens. 

Man turns inward and he worships himself and the wickedness of man multiplies on the earth and so God judges the earth with a cataclysmic flood. You think, okay, great, we get to start over now. We have a righteous family. 

Noah was righteous and blameless and what happens? Noah's blowing it not long after he gets off the boat and one of his sons is a complete rebel at heart. Ham and his line and Canaan. Then man continues and in the shadow of the flood judgment and God's mercy that you think would be a kind of a timeless lesson, man decides to reject God and create a one-world order and create a name for himself and seeks to build the Tower of Babel so that he can prevent being dispersed on the face of the earth and he can make a great name for himself and he can control his own destiny. 

And so God confuses the languages and he disperses mankind and mankind disperses and yet again that does not solve the corruption problem. It just just spreads it out. It just puts it in new places. 

It's like the cat in a hat when the stain just keeps multiplying further and further and further. Man's solution to his sin problem does nothing to remedy the situation. So we find this family dispersed now throughout this region and it is here that God is going to come and bring his grace to bear to a man that we know as Abram entitled this morning's message from the roots of idolatry from the roots of idolatry.

According to Galatians chapter 3 all of those who are expressing faith in Christ are sons of Abraham. Okay so if you are in Christ you are a spiritual child a spiritual son certainly could be a daughter but the idea there is the family resemblance the family likeness of Abraham. In other words in the way God saved him it's how God saved you. 

Your faith looks like Abram's faith. I apologize in advance I'm going to say Abram and Abraham. I'm going to call Abram Abraham when it's the wrong name. 

Just happens name change partway through life. It's very challenging to keep up with. Bear with me you can be patient. 

But this morning we're going to be introduced to our spiritual father and arguably one of the greatest figures in the book of Genesis. If you're to think about it just in this way we're 11 chapters in and we've covered 2,000 years of history more or less in 11 chapters. Now we're going to get to Abraham and park it. 

I think 14 chapters on the life of Abraham. He's that significant as understanding our salvation and how God has brought it about in our lives. If you're to look at the key verse for this morning it comes to us in chapter 11 verse 31 where we read, And Terah took Abram his son and Lot the son of Haran his grandson and Sarai his daughter-in-law his son Abram's wife and they went out together from Ur of the Chaldeans in order to go to the land of Canaan and they came as far as Haran and settled there. 

This is God calling a pagan an idolater to himself and it is a remarkable account. So as usual let's read the passage we're going to look at this morning chapter 11 beginning in verse 10 and we're going to see how Moses frames this up to help us understand Abram's background. Verse 10 begins, These are the generations of Shem. 

Shem was 100 years old became the father of Arpachshad two years after the flood. Shem lived 500 years after he became the father of Arpachshad and he became the father of other sons and daughters and Arpachshad lived 35 years and became the father of Shelah and Arpachshad lived 403 years after he became the father of Shelah and he became the father of other sons and daughters and Shelah lived 30 years and became the father of Eber and Shelah lived 403 years after he became the father of Eber and he became the father of other sons and daughters. Eber lived 34 years and became the father of Peleg and Eber lived 430 years after he became the father of Peleg and he became the father of other sons and daughters and Peleg lived 30 years and became the father of Reu and Peleg lived 209 years after he became the father of Reu and became the father of other sons and daughters and Reu lived 32 years and became the father of Sereg and Reu lived 207 years after he became the father of Sereg and he became the father of other sons and daughters. 

Sereg lived 30 years and became the father of Nahor and Sereg lived 200 years after he became the father of Nahor and he became the father of other and daughters Nahor then lived 29 years and became the father of Terah and Nahor lived 119 years after he became the father of Terah and he became the father of other sons and daughters and Terah lived 70 years and became the father of Abram, Nahor and Haran Now these are the generations of Terah. Terah became the father of Abram, Nahor, and Haran and Haran became the father of Lot, and Haran died in the presence of Terah, his father in the land of his birth, in Ur of the Chaldeans. Abram and Nahor took wives for themselves.

The name of Abram's wife was Sarai, and the name of Nahor's wife was Milcah. The daughter of Haran, the father of Milcah, and the father of Iscah. Sarai was barren.

She had no child. And Terah took Abram, his son, and Lot, the son of Haran, his grandson, and Sarai, his daughter-in-law, his son, Abram's wife, and they went out together from Ur of the Chaldeans in order to go to the land of Canaan, and they came as far as Haran and settled there. The days of Terah were 205 years, and Terah died in Haran.

This morning Moses is going to give us three insights that reveal Abram's roots. It's very important sometimes to know where somebody hails from. I love that process of getting to know people.

You might have someone that you met, maybe even as part of a congregation here. You kind of get to know them a little bit. You hear a little bit about their story, and then you get a chance to sit down and talk at length, and you hear about their background.

You hear about their upbringing and their roots, and suddenly you feel like you understand the person in a whole new way. Because it's not only significant, their newness of life in Christ, but also where the Lord has brought them from, what He's brought them out of. So this is very important for us in understanding our own spiritual heritage to understand Abram.

And Moses is going to begin first by showing us this morning his bloodlines. We're going to look at really Abram's family of origin, if you will. Where is it that he originated in terms of the family tree? And Moses, once again, is into genealogies.

So that's this whole section from verse 10 through 26 is a genealogy. We're not going to get into it in great detail, but I want to give you really maybe the primary two takeaways here that I think we ought to draw out of it. And if you have questions, further questions on the technical side, just send me an email, and I'd be happy to dive deeper with you.

But this morning, we're not going to get overly technical. First, understand that part of the purpose of this genealogy is it helps us orient where the flood took place in human history. So if you're kind of tracking this through Genesis so far, Moses gave us a genealogy in chapter 5 from Adam to Noah.

And then it's as if he takes a little break and addresses the flood, addresses Babel, and now he picks things back up with the genealogy. And as we said, this genealogy is very interesting. It's unlike other genealogies in Scripture in that it's pegging dates.

How old the dad was when the child was born. We said the reason why that's significant is because it's constructed in such a way as to not only allow you to add up the numbers, but really to require it. That's not superfluous information.

Most genealogies, if you read the genealogies in Matthew chapter 1, if you read the genealogies in Luke, they just give the names. They're showing the family relations. So-and-so begat so-and-so who begat so-and-so.

We want you to know who's in the family. The only reason for all of these numbers is to help us understand when the flood took place. And so, as we recognize that the Bible demonstrates a young earth, it is from passages like this that you can construct with reasonable certainty the general idea of how many years all these generations came together.

That's the first purpose. The second purpose is to show how God's sovereign grace came to a particular family of promise. How God's sovereign grace came to a particular family of promise.

If you look at how Moses begins, he says, these are the generations of Shem, and Shem was 100 years old and became the father of Arpachshad two years after the flood. So, we learn from back in Genesis chapter 5, verse 32, that Noah had three sons. They were listed out.

Shem, followed by Ham, followed by Japheth. And Noah, according to Genesis 5, verse 32, was 500 years old when he began having children. Okay, got a little bit of a late start, we could say.

That's a long time to be on earth. I mean, that's a wise dad. You know, most fathers feel like they had kids and they didn't really know what they were doing yet.

Noah had been on the earth 500 years before he started having sons. You know, according to Genesis chapter 7, verse 6, that Noah was 600 years old when the floodwaters came. So, his boys were grown up at that point.

They were 100-year-olds when they were on the boat. Now, when you read that at first, you read in Genesis 5, verse 32, that he became the father of those three boys at age 500. It almost reads like he had triplets.

It's not the case. It's just recognizing that at 500, essentially, Noah became a father, and then it lists out the sons that he had. So, these sons would have come in separate births over the years.

And yet, what's interesting is that the birth order is messed up in that account. Genesis 5, verse 32 says that Noah became the father of Shem and Ham and Japheth. So, we would think firstborn, secondborn, thirdborn.

That's kind of the way we normally do things. For example, if you send out a Christmas card, what do you do? You list the firstborn kid first, and sometimes their age, and then the second kid, and the third kid. It's just normal that we go in chronology.

Well, if Moses was sending out the Christmas card here, he starts mixing up the order on us, because according to Genesis chapter 9, Ham is the son who sees Noah's nakedness. And the text says in Genesis 9, 24, when Noah awoke from his wine, he knew what his youngest son had done to him. So, isn't that interesting? Ham is listed almost like the middle child by Moses in the chronology, but then later, Moses clarifies, Ham is actually not number two, he's number three.

And when we go to put the rest of the dates together, we find that Japheth was the firstborn because Japheth was 100 when the flood started. Japheth was 100 when the flood started, and so this means that Shem would have been the second son, and he would have been 98 years old when the flood began. Why does that matter? Well, I don't know that the birth order is terribly significant, but it would be to understand this.

When Moses picks up his writing instrument in Genesis 11, verse 10, he's not talking about the firstborn son. He's highlighting Shem the second because there's a particular spiritual focus here, a particular emphasis. What is his purpose? It's not devoid of purpose.

Well, Shem is the line of blessing. Look in your Bibles at Genesis chapter 9, verse 26, when Noah knew what his youngest son had done to him, he curses Canaan, he saw the family traits of rebellion there, and then he said in verse 26, blessed be Yahweh the God of Shem, and let Canaan be his servant. May God enlarge Japheth, let him dwell in the tents of Shem, and let Canaan be his servant, and so God, Noah recognizes in this kind of prophetic blessing where the family traits are lining up, that Shem loves God, God loves Shem.

He incurs a blessing upon him, and it's quite possible in verse 27, that pronoun for him refers not to Japheth dwelling in the tents of Shem, but rather Yahweh himself dwelling in the tents of Shem. Since then, a divine blessing. And so here we see Shem's line and the significance of it.

What is significant about it? Well, the priority is assigned, because it is from Shem's line that eventually the Messiah will come. Eventually, from Shem's line, the Messiah will come. And so this begins to show the faithfulness of God is set apart upon Abram even before his birth.

I'd like to ask you, how much choice did you have regarding which family you were born into, right? For better or for worse? At some point, you kind of become cognizant, this is the family that I'm a part of. It wasn't as if I had a menu of options to choose from. I just found myself here.

So too, Abram is going to find himself in Shem's line, in the blessed line, the line of promise out of which God will redeem him. So skipping down to the end of this chronogeneology where we add together the dates and the names and we can piece together a set number of years, we're introduced to Abram's father whose name is Terah in verse 26. We read that Terah was 70 years and he became a father.

Similar thing that Moses does yet again here. So Abram is not the oldest brother, rather he's just the most significant brother. That's why he's listed first.

And we find that Terah, his father, was actually 130 years old when he had Abram born into the family. Genesis 11.26 says it was 70 years. You jump down to verse 32, we read that Terah lived for 205 years total.

We go back and see how old Abram was when he was called. Genesis 12.4 says that Abram was 75 years old when he departed from Haran. So what does that mean? Well, it means that Terah would have been 130 years old when Abram was born.

So again, Moses likes to switch the order. I would not encourage you to do that this next year on your Christmas card to take your most significant child and list them first on the Christmas card. But Moses here is highlighting and drawing attention to this particular individual because he will in fact become the most significant, the father of our faith.

And so if you're to just look then at kind of this macro genealogy, we have Moses connecting Adam to Noah and now Noah to Abram through the line of Shem. Okay, that's what we have. And so this is the family of origin.

And as I said, a picture of the earth is a dark place right now. There's wickedness multiplying on the earth. And yet God has a promise that he's going to keep to mankind and he's going to do it through this particular family, through this bloodline.

That's the first insight that reveals Abram's roots, God's providence, his plan, his promise to the family. Secondly, we're going to see Abram's background. We're going to see his background.

First, we saw his family of origin. Now we're really going to see his frame of reference. What did life look like for Abram? What was his upbringing? We don't have a lot of information, but we do have a few clues and we want to take a moment to highlight those.

Moses does this very thing. In verse 27, he says, now these are the generations of Terah. And we've been introduced to generations before.

Remember back in chapter 2 verse 4, we came to the generations of the heavens and the earth. Chapter 5 verse 1, the generations of Adam. Chapter 6 verse 9, the generations of Noah.

Chapter 10 verse 1, the sons of Noah. Chapter 11 verse 10, the generations of Shem. Now we come to the generations of Terah.

This is going to be regarding Abram's family, where Abram came from. And the next time that we read the generations won't be until chapter 25 when we meet Abram's sons. They'll then be Abraham, Isaac, and Ishmael.

And so Terah here is introduced to us. He becomes the father of three boys that are listed in non-chronological order. Abram, Nahor, and Haran.

Haran being the oldest, dies in the land of Ur, the Chaldeans, according to verse 28. And here it is, we begin to understand a little bit of Abram's background. Now when you think of the Chaldeans, probably what comes to mind is Daniel, and Babylon, and the Persian empires in that region.

You're not wrong in thinking that. This is kind of maybe the proto of some of those civilizations. We're kind of on the front end of those.

And Ur would have been a town in the region that later would have become Babylon. We found ruins of those areas. It's near the Euphrates River.

It was along an important trade route. So it was kind of at that time a flourishing region. It was also a place that had a ziggurat that was built to the moon god Sin.

And so moon worship was common in that region. And so that's the region. And we think, well, maybe Abram's family was a little bit different.

Well, according to verse 29, these two sons of Terah took wives for themselves. The name of Abram's wife was Sarai, and the name of Nahor's wife was Milcah. Sarai, of course, Sarai is Abram's half-sister in Genesis 20 verse 12.

He'll mention, okay, I called her my sister. Technically, she's really my half-sister and my wife. And so he said that she was the daughter of Abram's father.

So one of Terah's daughters, but they had different moms. So Abram marries his half-sister, Sarai. And the name Sarai means princess, likely taken from Shiratu, which was the female consort of the moon god.

Nahor marries his niece, this is his older brother's daughter, Milcah. Her name meant queen, which comes from Malkatu, which is the title for Ishtar, the moon god's daughter. And so you start to understand the names that the family's choosing for their children relate to false deities.

And you just imagine you're out in public this week, meet someone, they have some daughters, and you say, well, tell me about your daughters. What are their names? They say, well, we named this one Dabacheri. We named this one Maleficent.

We named this one Humanista. I mean, you start to get a little bit of a sense here that the family is portraying certain family values. And so you're right here in the text is we're understanding Abram's background.

He lives among an idolatrous people who worship the moon. And within that very own family, you have idolaters who are worshiping the moon god. One commentator says, given this picture, we must not approach the story of Abraham thinking that here is a commendable exception to the corruption of the human race, as seen at the Tower of Babel.

The evidence does not suggest that Abraham was looking to the god of Noah and Shem, trusting in his promise and looking to his word and hope. Instead, we should picture Terah's sons as standing on the ziggurat of Ur, gazing into the stars and bowing to the moon. Okay, well, that sounds to me just a little conjecture-y.

Joshua chapter 24, verse 2. Joshua says to all the people this. Listen as I read it. This says, Yahweh, the God of Israel, from ancient times your fathers lived beyond the river, namely Terah, the father of Abraham and the father of Nahor, and they, plural pronouns, served other gods.

Abraham grew up as an idolater. He was steeped in idolatry. He worshipped the moon.

You met Abraham, the father of our faith, and he said, Abraham, tell me about your background. He'd say, well, as Richard Phillips puts it, I came from an inbred family of idolaters. That's what you should picture when you think of father Abraham.

He did not hail from a good family. And there was the knowledge of Yahweh already on the earth. He came from a godly line.

Good night, Shem is still on the earth. You understand that? A man who lived through the flood and survived to tell about it. And so the knowledge of God is still on the earth.

Recent memory of the flood. People who are living who lived through it. The Tower of Babel, the whole nine yards.

Abraham is a false worshipper. He was an idolater. Ephesians 2 that was just referenced this morning describes that kind of life.

Ephesians 2, 12. Remember that you were at that time without Christ alienated. Strangers having no hope and without God in the world.

That is Abram's upbringing. He is an idolater. And we know what idolatry brings.

Spiritual darkness, bondage, slavery to sin, destructive lifestyle, destructive habits. It's debased. Idolatry is commonly found in the scriptures side by side with sexual sin and bondage to it.

And so this is what Abram grows up in. This is the father of our faith. This is his background.

And sometimes in the church, we get discouraged by our background. We get discouraged by how much, how many miles we've gone in sin. Sometimes the hearts of God's people were filled with regrets of things that we've done that are shameful or undoable, lost opportunities.

The text says that Abram was 75 years old when the call of God came to him. 75 years in idolatry. 75 years of being unregenerate.

75 years of indulging the flesh apart from the spirit. And so Abram serves as a testimony for all of us of God's redemptive work and plan. And part of how God is glorifying himself in Abram is not by grabbing the squeaky clean kid, rather a 75-year-old pagan, 75-year-old rebel and calling him to himself.

There's in that God glorifies himself by saving people who are far off, who are lost in spiritual darkness. It testifies to the greatness of his salvation. And when he saves idolaters, he makes them new and praise God for that reality.

1 Corinthians 6, it's one of the most precious sections in Scripture when Paul tells the church that idolaters will never inherit the kingdom of God. And then he says, but such were some of you. And then what does he say? You were washed.

You were sanctified. You were justified. In the name of the Lord, Jesus Christ and the spirit of our God.

So Abram, who will be justified by faith, started out in a very dark spiritual place. And God glorified himself through this background. Do you not so appreciate that? That the father of our faith didn't start out with a good background, but a bad background.

Started out demonstrating the power of God to rescue sinners. The fact that who you are and where you've been and what you've done has no bearing, if you repent and believe, no bearing on your spiritual standing. Three insights reveal Abram's roots.

First, we see his bloodlines that he is in the line of promised blessing. Secondly, we saw his background and his frame of reference that he was an idolater. And third, we're going to see his break.

We're going to see him depart from that past. We're going to see his faith in action. And for some of you, because you grew up, maybe not hearing the gospel, maybe not knowing it, it's a clear break.

You saw that transformation. For others, perhaps you grew up in the church, you heard the gospel your whole life. And you say, I can't really remember a day that I didn't believe in the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Well, either way, this is the spiritual transformation in the heart that's true of you. Whether you have a clear moment in time that you can see that, or whether just now you say, I know I love Jesus and I trust him. Either way, this is true of you.

The same kind of break with the old life that took place in the life of Abram. Now we read in verse 31 that Terah took Abram, his son, and Lot, the son of Haran, his grandson. So he takes Abram and Lot, and Sarai, his daughter-in-law, his son, Abram's wife.

Now at this point, Sarai is barren. Her and Abram had been married long enough to know that that situation is not going to change. And so without saying it, Moses is saying it, that this was a hard situation, okay? They've already suffered a bit.

Started out, got married, assumed like most married couples do, we'll just have kids. Weeks become months, the months become years, the years turn into decades. Abram's in his 70s, she's probably not too far behind.

I think about a decade, and they realize we're not having children. There's a suffering associated with that in this particular day and age. Not only the heartache of an unfulfilled longing and expectation, but even the cultural kind of societal thought that there might be something wrong with you, that you've done in your life, or the gods are somehow opposed to you.

There's an additional reproach, but they leave. And the way Moses writes it in verse 31, it almost sounds like Terah is the one who has the idea, Terah is the leader. He's, of course, the patriarch, the fatherhead.

Terah takes them and leaves. I think that Moses here is, he's honoring Terah. And I think Terah decided he would go along with it.

But the call came not to Terah, but to Abram. Look at chapter 12, verse 1. And Yahweh said to Abram, go forth from your land and from your kin and from your father's house to the land which I will show you. So Abram shows up one day.

I can't even imagine this. Here's this idolater who's been worshiping the moon. And the Lord comes to him.

And he speaks into that darkness. He says, Abram, I want you to get up and go. I want you to leave behind all that you've known.

When Abram hears it, he believes he just heard the voice of God. And he responds in faith. And he starts to talk to his family.

And it would be that some of them would go. Lot would go with him. Haran did not.

And so he takes his father. And we read this kind of interesting note. They leave the land from Ur of the Chaldeans.

They leave this pagan land to go to the land of Canaan. And according to the end of verse 31, they came as far as Haran and settled there. Later, we'll find out that from Stephen's testimony in Acts chapter 7, that Abram's father died in Haran.

Now, if you look at a map, I'm going to do this so poorly. Um, it's not a straight shot to get from Ur to Canaan through Haran. They made a little detour, a pit stop.

And the interesting thing about Haran is that it was, was a flourishing town at that time, a prosperous town. And so it seemed that Terah, in some sense, was interested in going along to the land of Canaan. But he didn't want to go all the way.

And so they stopped in Haran and the text says they settled there. They settled there. It's interesting, commentators are a bit divided here, but quite possibly this is kind of the half-hearted, non-committal, start to put your hand to the plow to trust Jesus, but pull back kind of person.

Terah leaves Ur, unlike his other son who stayed back, but he falls short of Canaan, gets distracted along the way. They stay in the land of Haran. Then, of course, when Terah dies, which is what we read in verse 32, he dies in Haran, he never makes it to Canaan.

Abram will continue to the land of promise. And because Abram is the father of our faith, I want you to see for a moment Abram's faith and his faith in action. And this is going to be a theme that we look at over and over and over from different vantage points.

Abram's faith and his faith in action. What took place in this conversion experience? Because it's Abram responding to the call of God that demonstrates his faith. And the New Testament is clear that Abram believed God, and God did what? He credited it to him as righteousness.

And so sometimes people come to this and they say, well, this is how it works. You simply choose at some point to turn your life around. You choose God.

You choose to make it a decisive moment in time. You choose now a new path and a new way. Sometimes people will say things even like this.

God is a gentleman and he never imposes his will on anyone. Rather, he lets you choose. And so that's a false understanding of how God operates.

And I would encourage you to examine the scriptures because the scriptures don't teach that with respect to salvation. In fact, if you want to know what happens when God leaves man with the ultimate choice, the Bible is clear that man always chooses against God. He always chooses idolatry.

I mean, it's not been demonstrated yet through Genesis so far. What happens when God removes his restraining grace and lets man choose? We have the fall in the garden. We have the rebellion before the flood.

We have the tower of Babel. And so the idea of a free will, so to speak, is not a biblical doctrine. I would encourage you to examine the scriptures.

You will not find the concept there. Nowhere is the idea of exercising free choice described in the Bible with how it is that man would come to God in salvation. And his track record is always choosing opposed to God.

The Bible says there is none who seeks God. Rather, there's something else in operation here. Yes, Abraham exercises faith.

Yes, he chooses God. Yes, he believes in one sense. But what took place first? First, Nehemiah 9, 7, in a corporate prayer there in Israel, the scripture says this, You are Yahweh God who chose Abram, who chose Abram and brought him out from Ur of the Chaldees.

You understand, Abraham expresses faith, but he expresses faith because of the electing love of God that effectually called him to himself. How is it that that works? Well, the Westminster Confession of Faith is clear. All those whom God hath predestined unto life and those only he is pleased in his appointed and accepted time effectually to call.

Effectually to call by his word and spirit out of that state of sin and death in which they are by nature to grace and salvation, enlightening their minds spiritually and savingly to understand the things of God, taking away their heart of stone and giving them a heart of flesh, renewing their wills by his almighty power, determining them to that which is good and effectually drawing them to Jesus Christ. Get this, yet so as they come, not against their will, listen to this, yet so as they come most freely being made willing by his grace. See, when Abram heard that call, Abram, go forth from your land and from your kin and from your father's house.

That's God's sovereign choice. You see, there's thousands of people on the globe at that point. And God chooses, I'm going to come to Abram.

That's the one I want. It's of his own free will, God's own free will. He comes to Abram and he speaks to Abram and he calls Abram.

And when he does, he calls him in such a way that Abram of his own will and volition and finds himself willing by God's grace to respond. New Testament is the same way in its description. Jesus said it this way in John 6, 44, no one can come to me unless the father who sent me draws him.

Doesn't push him, but does effectually draw him. Philippians, Paul would say it this way to that church, for it is God who is at work in you both to will and to work for his good pleasure. Philippians 2, 13.

The apostle Peter then would say that you are to be diligent in 2 Peter 1, 10 to make your calling and choosing sure. So why is Abraham in the faith? Abraham's in the faith because it pleased God to go find an idolater worshiping the moon on the shore of the Euphrates, content in his settled pleasure and sin, and to effectually call him to himself. Brothers and sisters, this is the father of our salvation.

It depicts your own salvation. If you're in Christ, Galatians 3, then Abraham is your father according to the faith. This is your story too.

And so Abraham, here's that call. And here's a message that frankly, no one really wants to hear. Verse 1 of chapter 12, go forth from your land and from your kin and from your father's house to the land of which I will show you.

Abraham, leave everything that you've known. Leave it behind. Leave your gods.

Leave your flourishing city. Leave the plans you've had, whatever you've established over 75 years. The plans that you and Sarai had set about.

All of your kin that you enjoy and follow me to a place that's sight unseen. And what does Abraham do? Well, God, I believe you, but I'm not really going to act yet. No, this is faith in action.

Abraham, excuse me, believes God and immediately springs into action. Hebrews 11, 10 says that Abraham was looking for the city which has foundations whose architect and builder is God. He believed God and looked to that which was unseen.

And so Abraham here leaves prosperity. He leaves comfort. He leaves all that he has known and held dear based upon simple trust in the promise of God.

And Abraham is an example to us of living faith. It's very similar to what Jesus would say in Luke chapter 9. When he said to the crowds, if anyone wishes to come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it.

But whoever loses it for my sake, he is the one who will save it. See, when you look at Father Abraham, we're going to be exploring in the next weeks together. We start out here at his roots and we see some very important things.

We see that God saves very bad people by his sovereign grace. And they have a new beginning in him. And we see that that is his work to effectually call his chosen people to himself.

It means that if you're in Christ, you're one of God's elect. That's a tremendous comfort. This week, as I am repenting of sin in my heart, I'm comforted to know by God's grace, I'm one of his elect.

It's his power. It's his work. It's his sovereign will.

And at the same time, reminded by Abraham that a faith that is alive is a faith that works. It is a faith that springs into action. It is a faith that responds.

And so when you look at Abraham, you're to immediately be, if you're in Christ, encouraged and reminded. God's providential orchestration of events in your own life to bring you to himself. And just be comforted.

My salvation does not ultimately depend upon me, but upon his faithfulness. And then secondly, to just ask, is there anywhere that my faith is not springing into action here the way Abraham's was? And I just so appreciate that. He doesn't appear to delay or excuse or put off or avoid.

God says, go forth. And what would seem is he starts packing up that night. We got to go.

I'm going to follow God. I believe God. And it was credited to him as righteousness.

Well, it is going to be such a blessing to go through this because we're going to see Abraham's struggle. He's got a whole lot of human in him still. And so he's going to make mistakes along the way.

We're also going to see God's faithfulness in ways that are absolutely marvelous for understanding our own salvation and God's covenant promise to Abraham. Will you pray with me? It is so good to be reminded, Lord, of how you bring yourself glory. It fills our hearts with strength and confidence to be reminded of simply the way that you operate and to understand by way of analogy and be reminded of your sovereign grace that came to us.

Thank you so much for your faithfulness. Thank you that your salvation is not based upon the one who runs or the one who works or the one who wills, but that it depends upon you and your mercy. And Father, I pray that as we study this patriarch and this father of our faith, would you encourage and strengthen us in our faith, Lord, and wherever it is that you're calling us to trust you right now.

We ask this in Jesus' name. Amen.