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Genesis 13:1-18
13:1 So Abram went up from Egypt, he and his wife and all that he had, and Lot with him, into the Negeb.
2 Now Abram was very rich in livestock, in silver, and in gold. 3 And he journeyed on from the Negeb as far as Bethel to the place where his tent had been at the beginning, between Bethel and Ai, 4 to the place where he had made an altar at the first. And there Abram called upon the name of the LORD. 5 And Lot, who went with Abram, also had flocks and herds and tents, 6 so that the land could not support both of them dwelling together; for their possessions were so great that they could not dwell together, 7 and there was strife between the herdsmen of Abram’s livestock and the herdsmen of Lot’s livestock. At that time the Canaanites and the Perizzites were dwelling in the land.
8 Then Abram said to Lot, “Let there be no strife between you and me, and between your herdsmen and my herdsmen, for we are kinsmen.1 9 Is not the whole land before you? Separate yourself from me. If you take the left hand, then I will go to the right, or if you take the right hand, then I will go to the left.” 10 And Lot lifted up his eyes and saw that the Jordan Valley was well watered everywhere like the garden of the LORD, like the land of Egypt, in the direction of Zoar. (This was before the LORD destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah.) 11 So Lot chose for himself all the Jordan Valley, and Lot journeyed east. Thus they separated from each other. 12 Abram settled in the land of Canaan, while Lot settled among the cities of the valley and moved his tent as far as Sodom. 13 Now the men of Sodom were wicked, great sinners against the LORD.
14 The LORD said to Abram, after Lot had separated from him, “Lift up your eyes and look from the place where you are, northward and southward and eastward and westward, 15 for all the land that you see I will give to you and to your offspring forever. 16 I will make your offspring as the dust of the earth, so that if one can count the dust of the earth, your offspring also can be counted. 17 Arise, walk through the length and the breadth of the land, for I will give it to you.” 18 So Abram moved his tent and came and settled by the oaks2 of Mamre, which are at Hebron, and there he built an altar to the LORD.
(ESV)
Redeemer exists to celebrate and declare the gospel of God as we grow in knowing and following Jesus Christ.
Genesis chapter 13. Last week, we began to look at the call of Abram and how God had asked Abram to leave his country and to go to places unknown, places that God would lead him. And in doing so, God said that he would bless Abram and bless the entire earth through Abram. And so this was God's call on Abram's life, and this call we're gonna see is going to be repeated some 12 times throughout Genesis. In some various forms or another, this call will be repeated 12 times.
Joel Brooks:It's the the defining moment of Abram's life. He's defined by his call and his response to it. And that's true of us as well. Our lives are defined by God's calling upon us and our response to it. And we can actually learn a lot about our calling by looking at Abram's calling.
Joel Brooks:And ultimately, what we realized we were being called to is to whom do we place our hope? Genesis 13 beginning reading in verse 1. So Abram went up from Egypt, he and his wife and all that he had and lot with him into the Negeb. Now Abram was very rich in livestock, in silver, and in gold. And he journeyed on from the Negeb as far as Bethel to the place where his tent had been at the beginning, between Bethel and Ai, to the place where he had made an altar at the first.
Joel Brooks:And there Abram called upon the name of the Lord. And Lot, who went with Abram, also had flocks and herds and tents, so that the land could not support both of them dwelling together. For their possessions were so great that they cannot dwell together. And there was strife between the herdsmen of Abram's livestock and the herdsmen of Lot's livestock. At the time the Canaanites and the Perizzites were dwelling in the land.
Joel Brooks:Then Abram said to Lot, let there be no strife between you and me and between your herdsmen and my herdsmen for we are kinsmen. Is not the whole land before you? Separate yourself from me. If you take the left hand then I will go to the right, or if you take the right hand then I will go to the left. And Lot lifted up his eyes and saw that the Jordan Valley was well watered everywhere like the garden of the Lord, like the land of Egypt and the direction of Zor.
Joel Brooks:This was before the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah. So Lot chose for himself all the Jordan Valley, and Lot journeyed east. Thus they separated from each other. Abram settled in the land of Canaan, while Lot settled among the cities of the valley and moved his tent as far as Sodom. Now the men of Sodom were wicked, great sinners against the Lord.
Joel Brooks:The Lord said to Abram after Lot had separated from him, lift up your eyes and look from the place where you are, northward and southward and eastward and westward. For all the land that you see, I will give to you and to your offspring forever. I will make your offspring as the dust of the earth, so that that if one can count the dust of the earth, your offspring can also be counted. Arise, walk through the length and breadth of the land for I will give it to you. So Abraham moved his tent and came and settled by the oaks of Mamre, which are at Hebron.
Joel Brooks:And there he built an altar to the Lord. This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. Pray with me. Father, it's so good to be gathered together in this place with with the family that you have called together, united together through your spirit.
Joel Brooks:And we come as your children now to hear from you from your word. Lord, may my words fall the ground and blow away and not be remembered anymore. But, lord, may your words remain, and may they change us. We pray this in the strong name of Jesus. Amen.
Joel Brooks:So the question that comes up as we read this text is, are our decisions based on fear or are they based on faith? That's really what the story is about. Last week we got to see how Abraham, he started off strong following God. But then at the first sign of difficulty, fear drove him. Fear is what drove him away from the promised land.
Joel Brooks:Fear led him into Egypt. Fear is what caused him to lie to pharaoh about his wife Sarah. So instead of faith dictating what he did, fear took over. And Jeff did a great job last week of walking us through Abraham's moments of faith in his moments of fear. But do you know what happened as a end result of Abraham's failure and his sin?
Joel Brooks:Do you know do you know what happened as a result of him sinning? Blessing. Abraham sinned and he was blessed. Blessed in every possible way. Remember he was scared of going to pharaoh because he thought pharaoh was going to kill him to get his wife.
Joel Brooks:Now he lies to that same pharaoh, and pharaoh actually finds out yes, Sarai is his wife. And after lying and deceiving to him, pharaoh doesn't kill him but instead blesses him. Sends him away with incredible wealth. So instead of being punished, he's blessed. And in just case you think this is an anomaly, this is something we're going to see happen over and over throughout Genesis, over and over to the patriarchs.
Joel Brooks:Later, Abram's gonna do pretty much the exact same thing in chapter 20. He's going to lie about Sarah being his wife and say she is his sister. The end result is blessing, more wealth. Abra Abraham's son, Isaac, is going to do the exact same thing. Lie about his wife saying his wife is his sister.
Joel Brooks:The end result is going to be that he is blessed. You're gonna see this over and over. You you get to the life of Jacob and it's almost comical. Jacob sees kinda like the Han Solo of scripture. He's this he's this scoundrel kind of guy.
Joel Brooks:And, he really he lives a despicable life, yet every bad choice, every sin he makes God blesses him and blesses him and blesses him. Every lie, every deceit, he's blessed. A matter of fact when he comes towards the end of his life, the one time he finally calls out to the Lord and he prays, God responds by coming down wrestling with him, dislocating his hip and he walks with a limp for the rest of his life. I mean they don't teach you that in Sunday school. Like you know, you you call out to the Lord, that's when you're injured.
Joel Brooks:You lie and you deceive and you sin and God blesses you, But this is the pattern, make no mistake, as you walk through this book. Over and over, God blesses even when these men of faith that we call them sin. What's going on? Why is God doing this? What God is teaching Abraham here, and he's gonna teach throughout the rest of the chapters as we look at the patriarchs is that he is not like the other gods.
Joel Brooks:He's not like the other gods. He's not like the other religions that are around. He is nothing like them. They are a God of works. He is a God of grace.
Joel Brooks:Every other religion at this time said that if you wanted the gods to bless you, you must work for it. You must serve them. You scratch those gods backs and they will scratch yours. So you gotta do good. You gotta go to church.
Joel Brooks:You got to give to the offering. You've gotta walk little old ladies across the street. You've got a preset at least one of your radio stations to Christian radio. I mean, I I still do that even though I've never pushed the button but I feel like I have to do that. You you do those things and God will reward you.
Joel Brooks:Right? But that's not how God operates, And you should be so thankful for that. The Lord is teaching Abram that he cannot relate to the true God this way. All of us have sinned. All of us have fallen short of God's glory.
Joel Brooks:None of us ever deserve his blessing. No matter how much work we do, But God is a God of grace. So Abram does wrong. God still blesses him. He does not repay Abram according to his sins.
Joel Brooks:He does not repay Abram according to his iniquities. Several of you know this story, but, my oldest girl, Caroline, when she was probably about 5 years old. She was that, you know, your perfect firstborn rule follower. You know, every parent same thing, their first child are like, I don't know if the fall affected them. And then you find out later it does.
Joel Brooks:But but but but she was that that rule follower to the core. And she loved letting us know when she was doing something good, and she equally loved letting us know when her little sister was doing something bad. She had this strong sense of right and wrong and she wanted to please us. She would even discipline herself. I remember one time, we told her she can't use adult pens.
Joel Brooks:And I heard yelling in her room and I went in there and she had an adult pen, a Sharpie marker, and she was drawing on her arm, and she was going, no. No. She knew it was wrong and she couldn't stop. And then after I looked at her, what are you doing? She started spanking herself.
Joel Brooks:It was, like, it was so easy parenting that child, but so she had this strong sense of right or wrong. She really wanted to please us. And so one time she did something pretty bad. I actually don't remember exactly what it was. And I said, okay go to your room.
Joel Brooks:And when she went to a room and I ran to Walmart and I bought a Barbie, and then I came back. And, I went in a room and I said, you know what you did was really bad. And, her lips little quivering. She's like, yes. I said, so here's what I'm gonna do.
Joel Brooks:I'm gonna give you this Barbie. She looks at me like there's no way she could process this. She's like, but I did something wrong. I said, I know it was really bad and so I wanna give you this Barbie. It's like, but I did something wrong.
Joel Brooks:I said, I know you did something wrong and I'm giving you this Barbie. And so what I want you to realize here is this is how God relates to us. He doesn't treat us according to our sins. This is a child who needed to understand grace. I don't prescribe this by the way parents.
Joel Brooks:Don't I'm not prescribing. If I had done that with Natalie, my second child, she would've gone to see how many kids she could, like, beat up or lie to so she get more Barbies. But, like, as parents, you're you do desperate things. One of my friends one time, he he was he didn't know how to discipline his child. He took off his belt and he goes, you spank me.
Joel Brooks:And he bent over. And then he's like he goes, I don't even know what I was doing. I was trying to teach him substitutionary atonement, you know, and then I like crazy things drive you as parents. So try anything. I don't prescribe that.
Joel Brooks:But my child needed to learn grace. It does not come naturally to us. We think we work for something, and then we get something, but nobody just is good to us despite of what we do. So God is planting these seeds of grace in these patriarchs' lives. And, man, when that seed is planted in Abram's life, it explodes in growth.
Joel Brooks:He is utterly transformed. He's not perfect after this by any means, but he's transformed. Abraham begins thinking this, if God is so gracious to me despite my sin And if this same God is so powerful that he can even cause Pharaoh to be gracious to me and he can protect me in that. That's a God that deserves all of my trust. And I could give my entire life to that God.
Joel Brooks:So Abram begins to move from fear to faith. And because he was shown grace, he now begins to give grace. And because he was shown the power of God, he now begins to trust in the power of God. And that's what we see in this story is Abraham moving from fear to faith. Abraham trusting in the power of God.
Joel Brooks:Alright. So let's get into the story. After this episode with pharaoh, we read in verse 3 that Abram returned back to Bethel to the place where his tent had been at the beginning between Bethel and Ai. To the place where he had made an altar at the first. And what we see here is Abram is, he's moving back to the place where he was last obedient.
Joel Brooks:Moving to the place where he was last obedient and he is starting over. What we're seeing is repentance. The grace of God did not lead Abram to keep on sinning. It led him to repentance. And we're gonna see the fruit of that repentance now and how he makes his decisions.
Joel Brooks:Abram had brought along with him his nephew Lot, and God had blessed them both. They were incredibly wealthy men. Now unfortunately for Abram and Lot, your wealth wasn't There was no banks. There was no paper money. Your wealth was in livestock, which took a whole lot of space.
Joel Brooks:And if you wanted to get even wealthier, well you needed even more space. But they were at a point now where the land could not sustain both of them. And so their herdsmen were beginning to quarrel with one another. We have this little odd note in verse 7 that the Canaanites and the Perizzites were dwelling in the land at this time. It's not just some throwaway comment there from the narrator.
Joel Brooks:This is the narrator's way of letting us know the world was watching. The pagan world was watching how these men would settle their dispute. Earlier, Abram just blew his testimony to pharaoh. He completely blew it. What is he going to do this time?
Joel Brooks:How is he going to handle at this time? And hear me, the world is watching. Watching every decision you make church. Every quarrel you have. Saying is this gonna be a decision you move forward in faith and in trust in God?
Joel Brooks:Or do you make decisions like the rest of the world? They're watching. And here we get to see the effect of God's grace on Abram's life. He takes Abram up to a place where they can see the whole land spread before them. And Abram says okay, Lot you choose.
Joel Brooks:You go that way, I'll go this way. You go that way and I'll go this way over here. You choose whichever land you want and I'll go in the opposite direction. And this is astounding that Abram would do this. I mean for 1 the land was promised to him not to Lot.
Joel Brooks:And also in a patriarchal society, this was Abram's choice to make, not Lot's. Abram could have just ended the dispute by saying, I I love you nephew. You have enough wealth, but I want you to go that way. Could have just told him the direction to go. But instead, he treats him with grace.
Joel Brooks:Unmerited favor. He treats Lot better than he deserves. Once again, because Abram received grace, Abram can now give grace. So what does Lot choose? Or perhaps a better question is this, how does Lot choose?
Joel Brooks:Look at verse 10. And Lot lifted up his eyes and saw that the Jordan Valley was well watered everywhere, like the garden of the Lord, like the land of Egypt in the direction of Zoar. This was before the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah. So Lot chose for himself all the Jordan Valley, and Lot journeyed east. Thus, they separated from each other.
Joel Brooks:So from this vantage point of Israel, you can see 2 very different lands. There's this lush Jordan Valley, and then there was this more arid plain area of Canaan. The choice seems fairly obvious, So Lot chooses the lush valley of Jordan. About 20 years ago, I came across a book that gave me some insight into this. It's The book is called The Art of Hebrew Narrative.
Joel Brooks:It's Despite its title, it's actually a pretty engaging book. It's written by a man named Robert Alter. He is, probably the top Hebrew scholar on narrative in the world. He teaches at Berkeley. And in this book, he comments on these verses.
Joel Brooks:He actually pulled out this narrative and and I I remember always remember his description of this. He says, the way that the narrator writes this is to let you know that this is not how the narrator sees things. This is how Lot sees things. We're actually getting to hear what is going on in Lot's head at this time. So when we read that Lot sees the Jordan Valley and he sees, This is like the well watered garden of Eden.
Joel Brooks:Garden of the Lord. And it's like the land of Egypt. That's what's going on in Lot's head. He looks at the Jordan Valley, and he thinks, Eden. This is Eden.
Joel Brooks:This is paradise. I can once again go back to paradise. You see ever since the fall, mankind has been trying to get back to Eden, trying to get back to that blessed place of rest. A place where things are just easy, things are safe, where you're unburdened. There's no weariness in your work.
Joel Brooks:There's no stress, there's no anxiety. Go back to that place where you don't have to try and impress your boss. You don't have to worry if you don't have enough money to pay the bills. You are not concerned as to how your children are going to turn out. It's a place of safety and rest, and all of us wanna get back there.
Joel Brooks:And Lot looks at that Jordan Valley, he thinks, Eden. I found it. That's what he's thinking. So without hesitation, he chooses it. So the question is, did Lot choose wisely?
Joel Brooks:What would you have chosen? Honestly, what would you have chosen if you were Lot? Or better question is this, what have you chosen? What choices have you made? This story asks some hard questions of us.
Joel Brooks:Where do you go to find your security and your comfort? Where do you go to get rid of your fears and your anxieties? Where do you go to have your needs met or to find rest? Make no mistake, Abram wants to live a blessed life. All the things that you hope for and you want in your life, Abram absolutely wants all of those things.
Joel Brooks:He wants a life that's safe, one that's free of worry, one where all of his needs are met. Absolutely he wants those things, which is why he saw his choice did not matter. That's actually what led him to say, well my choice doesn't matter. Lot, you choose. Choose wherever you wanna go because it doesn't matter.
Joel Brooks:My security and my significance is found in God alone. It's found on me obeying God's calling on my life. Not in what I see before me. My trust is not in the lush valley, but in the God who has lavished his grace on me. He's protected me in the past.
Joel Brooks:He will protect me in the future. He's blessed me in the past. He will bless me in the future. My hope rests in him. I mean, can you imagine what freedom that is?
Joel Brooks:What freedom. I mean, think of how much time and energy you spend, like, thinking of the choices. And Abel's like, it doesn't matter. Somebody else choose it for me because my hope's in God. And what we're seeing here is Lot is trusting in what his eyes see.
Joel Brooks:He's walking by sight and not by faith. An interesting, Lot thinks he's choosing paradise, but it's a paradise without God. And no time does lot seek the Lord in his decisions. He's thinking that actually going to a place will save him. Alright.
Joel Brooks:Let's put a fine point on this. A very fine point on this. And, can I just ask that you hang with me for a little bit before you get angry? Because you're probably gonna get angry. So just just hang with me before you get angry.
Joel Brooks:Alright. I I was doing this
Caleb Chancey:illustration with my wife and she got angry. She didn't hang with
Joel Brooks:me to the end. Hang with Hang with me to the end. Imagine, if you will, that you were taken up to a mountain. And on one side of the mountain, you could see well watered school systems, beautiful homes, fertile neighborhoods, profitable relationships, a land dripping with wealth, and the potential for more. And on the other side of the mountain, well, it was arid.
Joel Brooks:The schools were dry. The homes, small. The neighborhoods and the places were a barren wasteland. There's no profitable relationships there. You probably don't have to actually imagine too hard to picture this scene because we live it here in Birmingham.
Joel Brooks:So which do you choose? Do you choose to live in, finer point, Choose to live in Mountain Brook? Do you choose to live in Homewood or Vestavia? Or do you choose to live in Avondale or Woodlawn or Eastlake? Hear me clearly.
Joel Brooks:This text does not tell you. It does not tell you. Because that is not what this story is about. This story does not tell you where to live. It tells you whom to trust.
Joel Brooks:No matter where you live, who are you trusting for your significance and for your security? There is no right or wrong in either of those locations. Both of them actually have some pretty significant spiritual pitfalls. Each one of those locations have different idols. Those who choose to live in the mountain brooks or the homewoods of this world, they're going to struggle in putting their trust in those things.
Joel Brooks:They're they're gonna struggle by looking at the bounty of that land and throwing all of their trust and hope in that. They're gonna move into places in those neighborhoods and they're gonna think, ah finally I can rest. That's the idol there. The idol on the other side of the mountain is typically self righteousness. Look at the sacrifices that we have made.
Joel Brooks:And we like to pat ourselves on the back, thinking now that God owes me something. Idolatry is alive and well on both sides of the mountain. The question is this. Who or what are you placing your trust in? What actually leads you to make the decisions that you make?
Joel Brooks:Is it what your eyes tell you or is it the call of God? If you're unsure, ask your neighbors or your co workers, where do you think I'm placing my hope? Do they see that you're living any differently than them? When Lot was making his decision, we we read that he lifted up his eyes and he saw the well watered Jordan Valley. But Abraham or Abram in verse 14, we read that it was the Lord who told him to lift up his eyes and to see the land.
Joel Brooks:Lot looked at the situation alone. Abram looked at the situation with the Lord. And that made all the difference. Here's the ironic thing. It's it's the sad, the sad thing of this story.
Joel Brooks:Lot made his decision because his eyes were telling him that this was the best place. It's the place of comfort. It was the place that he could grow his wealth. He could raise his family. He can make a name for himself, But it's Lot that needs to be rescued later, not Abram.
Joel Brooks:It's Lot that has to be rescued from this. And not just once, he has to be rescued in the next chapter in chapter 14, but it was also gonna have to be rescued in chapter 20 or 19 and 20. And that time is gonna cost him. He went there thinking, Derek could find security, Derek could find safety, but it will cost him his family. It will cost him all of his wealth.
Joel Brooks:He's gonna end his life living in regret in a cave. Not because of the location, but because of where he placed his trust. And I have seen that story played out over and over again with people I dearly know and love. People who have made what seemed to be the obvious choice. No brainer.
Joel Brooks:Obvious. But, they didn't seek the Lord in it. Never once asking, Lord, is this where I'm to obey your calling on my life? So who do you trust? Is it your bank account?
Joel Brooks:I know college students are like, no. There's nothing in it. But why why are you going to school? Why are you going to school? Is it your neighborhood?
Joel Brooks:Is it your relationships? God is calling you to walk by faith and not by sight. Seek the Lord's calling on your life. You can trust him. Now some of you might be thinking that it was easier for Abram to to trust God because he actually heard God.
Joel Brooks:He actually heard God calling him in Genesis 12. And you know, one of the most frustrating things for you is like, how do I hear from the Lord? Actually, one of the most frustrating things I have when I read the Bible, you find this throughout Genesis, is is those little words and God said. Over and over, and God said to Moses or and God said to Abraham. You're like, how?
Joel Brooks:How did God actually say those things? I mean, was it a dream? Was it a deep impression? Like what was it? Because I feel like a lot of my life, I'm wondering what how does God speak?
Joel Brooks:We don't know how God spoke to Abraham. It was clear enough to where he could do this. We we do know that God only spoke to Abram 8 times in a 100 years. 8 times in a 100 years did God come and give him clear directions. That was a lot of silence.
Joel Brooks:A lot of waiting. I bet Abraham would have traded for what we have. We actually have a book that guides the way we live. In which we can read and we can study God's will and purpose for our life. And we have His spirit inside us.
Joel Brooks:Illuminating these words and and guiding how we should live. And we get that every day. Not 8 times in a 100 years. You might also think that was easier for Abraham to trust God because, well God had just shown Abram that he will protect them. And he will bless him, no matter what.
Joel Brooks:He just showed that to him when he went and he lied to pharaoh. But what do you have? Church, you have something so much better. You could look back on something so much greater to know that God does indeed love, protect, and bless you. We go to the cross.
Joel Brooks:All you have to do is look at the cross and know that you can indeed trust God. If God did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? Jesus did not endure hell on the cross in order to lose you. You will not be lost. Trust him.
Joel Brooks:He is worthy of your trust. Do you wanna get back to Eden? I mean, really get back to Eden. Do you wanna find that place and rest? Well, it's not in a place, it's in the person of Jesus Christ.
Joel Brooks:He says, come to me all who are weary and heavy laden and I will give you rest. That's what this story is about. That's what our calling is about. Is will we move from fear to faith in Jesus? Pray with me.
Joel Brooks:Lord, your word says that those who hope in you will not be disappointed. Jesus, you said, seek first your kingdom, and all these things shall be added to you. So God, I pray that we would move from fear to to faith, and we would place wholly our trust in you, Jesus, because you are worthy. Thank you for your love and for the forgiveness you have shown us on the cross. May our whole lives be shaped by that.
Joel Brooks:We pray this in the strong name of Jesus. Amen.