Title: 13
Author: Joe Griffin
Last saved by: PaulD
Company: GDC

The Church of the Living God

		09-03-15-A.FBC08-93 /

The Abrahamic & Palestinian Covenants; Abraham’s Use of the Faith-Rest Drill; Arab-Israeli Conflict Is Irresolvable, Gal 4:29; Anti-Semitism Clause, Gen 12:3

20.	Abram is saved but unhappy.  While in Haran the Lord proclaimed to Abram what has become known as the Abrahamic Covenant:
Genesis 12:2 -	“I will make you a great nation, I will bless you, and make your name great; and so you shall be a blessing.”
21.	When in Canaan the Lord gets more specific by adding the Palestinian Covenant:
Genesis 13:14 -	The Lord said to Abram, after Lot had separated from him, “Now lift up your eyes and look from the place where you are, northward and southward, and eastward, and westward;
v. 15 -	for all the land which you see, I will give to you and to your descendants forever.
v. 16 -	“I will make your descendants as the dust of the earth, so that if anyone can number the dust of the earth, then your descendants can also be numbered.”
22.	Genesis 15 finds Abram in Canaan concerned that he still remains childless.  The Lord perceives this and encourages him to orient to the fact he is saved and has received promises that the integrity of God must fulfill.  The Lord first reminds him of the Abrahamic Covenant:
Genesis 15:5 -	And the Lord took Abram outside and said, “Now look toward the heavens, and count the stars, if you are able to count them.”  And He said to him, “So shall your descendants be.”
23.	Since Abram didn’t catch the metaphor about the “dust of the earth,” the Lord tries out the “stars of the heavens,” each a teaching aid to communicate the idea of an innumerable progeny.
24.	Having seen this example and reminded of the promise of a nation and vast numbers of descendants, Abram is reminded of the grace of God that always begins at the moment of salvation.
25.	When someone believes in Christ, then all subsequent events are based on the relationship between the integrity of God and divine righteousness imputed to that person.
26.	Abram possesses the righteousness of God.  God possesses divine integrity.  When God issues a promise, let alone a covenant, then it must be fulfilled to the letter.
27.	The Abrahamic and Palestinian Covenants are contracts initiated by God, granted to Abram, and backed by divine integrity.  Righteousness insures the validity of the covenants, justice guarantees their execution, and love provides the wall of fire.
28.	Abram was impatient based on his advanced age.  But his ace in the hole was the fact he possessed the righteousness of God to which the covenants were imputed.
29.	Imputations cannot be revoked.  Therefore, God must fulfill the covenants which were each unconditional: Nothing depended on Abram.  Everything depended on the integrity of God.
30.	History demonstrates God’s love for the Jew.  They are prime targets for Lucifer’s forces since the land promised is coveted by the sons of Hagar, the prime opponents of the sons of Sarah.
31.	The Jew is not only hated by the Semitic hoards of history but also by Gentiles.  This hatred is irrational and explains the continuous conflict that rages in the Middle East.  
32.	The foreign policy of the New Sheriff has taken a significant tilt toward favoritism of the Palestinian terrorists Hamas and the Lebanese Hezbollah.  Their goal and ambition is to drive the Israelites into the sea and our nation’s tacit approval of their legitimacy is yet another sign of our country’s decline.
33.	Paul alerts us to the fact that the hatred of anti-Semitism will prevail until the Second Advent:
Galatians 4:29 -	Just as at that time [ the original assaults by Ishmael on Isaac ] the one born by natural descent [ Ishmael ] persecuted the one born according to the Spirit [ Isaac ], so it is now.  [net]
34.	Biblical documentation through the first century a.d., historical documentation from the first century to the present, and biblical prophecy certify Paul’s claim. 
35.	Yet Scripture also reports that regardless of the circumstances, the Jewish race will endure and overcome.  Presently, some are Messianic Jews, i.e., Church Age Jews who have believed in Jesus as Messiah; others are simply genetic Jews, i.e., those who have the genes of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob but not the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
36.	Paul speaks of the presence of a Jewish remnant in:
Romans 11:5 -	There has also come to be at the present time a remnant according to God’s gracious choice.
37.	The Lord prophesied the preservation of Israel and Abraham’s historical impact in:
Genesis 12:3 -	“I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse.  And in you all the families of the earth will be blessed.”
38.	All of this because of the imputation of divine righteousness to Abraham at the moment of his salvation.
39.	In the three English translations of Genesis 15:6 we have three different words translating the mechanics of this imputation: (1) KJV: “counted,” (2) NIV: “credited,” and (3) NASB “reckoned.”
40.	The Hebrew word is the Qal imperfect of the verb bv^j* chashav.  This is a bookkeeping term that refers to the technical accounting of a merchant.  The Greek word used in the New Testament and in our passage in Romans 4:3 is log…zomai, logizomai which also refers to a bookkeeping procedure.

© 2009 by Joe Griffin Media Ministries.  All rights reserved.	www.joegriffin.org