Pack Up And Go Sermon - Hebrews 11:8-12 - Dr. Joel Gregory

0:09 It's a delight and an honor and a privilege to be back here for a few Sundays on behalf of Reverend Dr. Ralph D. West, Sr., your founder, pastor, and my friend. This is the 14th year he's asked me to come by here, and I'm thankful for a few Sundays with you.

0:33 A little later than usual, but I'd rather be the late Joel Gregory late than the late Joel Gregory. So I'm, it's good to be here. It's an honor to share with this great church that I've come to love so well. And I commend you for letting the senior pastor have a few weeks off to take the string off of the bow and to relax before the fall campaign. I know you're on a journey together. I want you to open the Word of God with me to the story of the journeyer in Hebrews chapter 11 verses 8 through 12. If I call this message something, I'd call it Pack Up and Go. because that's the story of the patriarch, the father of all of those on the journey of faith.

1:38 And you have an abridgment, a digest, a synopsis, a condensation of his whole life in the book of Genesis found here in Hebrews 11. Would you look at the word of God from verse 8? By faith, Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place which he would receive as an inheritance. And he went out not knowing where he was going.

2:15 By faith, he dwelt in the land of promise as in a foreign country. dwelling in tents with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise, for he waited for a city which had foundations, whose builder and maker is God. By faith, Sarah herself also received strength to conceive seed, and she bore a child when she was past the age, because he judged him faithful who had promised. Therefore from one man and him as good as dead were born as many as the stars, as the sky and the multitude and innumerable as the sand which is by the seashore.

3:10 And it all started when God said, Pack up and go. Would you be seated, please? Let's pray a moment. Eternal God, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by faith the same God of us,

3:36 please take these ancient words and set them on fire in our own hearts so that we too may be people on a journey of faith. In Jesus' name we ask it. Amen.

3:58 If you'll give them between $650 and $2,000, the Pack Up and Go Company, founded in 2016, will send you on a vacation even though you don't know where they're sending you. This really may be the hobby for those who've tried everything.

4:24 You're right. You send them the money. They send you back a few questions. Do you like a hot place or a cold place? Are you allergic? What kind of activities do you like? and they plan a trip for you without telling you where you're going. Week beforehand, they'll send you something about the weather without telling you where you're going, what you might pack. And then the day before you leave, you get an envelope, but you don't open it until you get to the airport. And just before you go, you find out where Pack Up and Go is sending you on your surprise vacation. Now, I know to some people that would be a great joy. To others, it would be sheer terror.

5:16 There's a sense that 4,000 years ago, now think about that, as far on the other side of the cross as we are on this side of the cross, God spoke to a 75-year-old Iraqi that's what Abraham was and said I want you to pack up and go with me but I'm not telling you where I'm going to give you a country and your descendants will be more than the stars you can count but to live that way you're going to have to pack up and go come close to me nine out of ten of us and I'd be one of the nine if our next door neighbor to do that would say he's a religious nut just think about it what if your neighbor worked together played together for years suddenly said well God told me and Roberta and Leroy to get in the SUV and just go where are you going neighbor don't know he said just go. You go back inside your house and say he's lost his mind. I want to put that before you because what Abraham did, a wealthy man with likely a three-story house and we're told he had 318 on his household staff.

6:56 As he lost his mind, he just packed up and went. And yet the reason we're talking about him this morning is that three great world religions say he's their founder. Islam, Judaism, and Christianity all point back to this man 4,000 years ago who just packed up and went without knowing where. In fact, he's called the friend of God. I wouldn't have thought God had to have a friend. The friend of God. He's the first person in the Bible about whom it is explicitly said he believed God. And God counted him as righteous. I don't know how many steps he took.

7:48 He walked for a hundred years. When you think of him, you think of him walking. 1970, as a matter of record, in the book of records, one man walked around the world 14,500 miles, of course not counting the oceans. and he did that in four years. How much do you think Abraham walked across a hundred years? The furthest a human has ever been measured to walk in one day, 24 hours, is 108 miles. I wonder how much he walked. Now we have these devices that count how many steps we take. You know what I'm talking about? The average man takes 5,400 a day. Yesterday I had 4,250 because I drove down here to preach and didn't walk as much. How many steps do you think Abraham took? The pastor has challenged this great church to go on a journey. And that's the motif of the life of Abraham. I'd like us to put our little feet in his big footprints today because this same chapter I read said without faith it is impossible to please God. Didn't say without a PhD, without being a member of the Mensa Society, it didn't say without being perfect, but it said without faith. I want to show you how that looks today simply from his life. The journey of faith enables you to go with God without knowing next where. Look at verse 8. It says, by faith, Abraham obeyed what called, go out, went out, not knowing. This is a verse of verbs are verbal forms.

9:47 he's on his way the very grammar suggested as the voice of god was ringing in his ear he was already going a contemporary of jesus fellow judaos who also wrote about abraham 2 000 years ago halfway back to him said abraham left home to go to a foreign place so long you'd think that god had asked him to leave a foreign place and go back home the reason remembering him is when God spoke, he got up and he went. You can read the whole story beginning in Genesis chapter 11. His father Terah, T-E-H-R-A, 205 years old, left Ur and went to Haran, northeast of the Holy Land. And there Terah died at 205. Abraham was 75, buried his father, and God said, go. And he walked out into the desert without next knowing where. Wouldn't you like to know how God spoke to him? It was centuries before there was a written word of scripture. Did he speak to him in a vision by day up there in the blazing sunlight, in a dream by night, like he spoke to his great grandson Joseph? Did he speak to him in an audible voice?

11:08 Abram go I remember one time the president of my denomination stated that God told him not to run a second time and a cynical reporter said did he tell you that in an audible voice and he said no he spoke a whole lot louder than that sometimes it's God and you know maybe he just got disgusted with the moon worship of his moon worshiping Mesopotamian relatives and he said there's got to be more out there of a god than the moon but he just walked out with god going without knowing where and he did it without excuses he's 75 years old at a time when we think we want to pack hang it up he had to pack it up and go with god for another hundred years God, when it comes to where you're going, is not going to give you a lifetime roadmap.

12:15 He's not going to tell you what's around the next bend at your job. He's not going to reveal to you what's around the next corner at your health. he's not going to hand you a road map of the ups and downs of your marriage or your family and you will have them you don't know what's around the next corner and you know why God wants to get your eyes off the road and on him that's the reason Jesus said in John 14 I am the way he didn't say I'm going to show you the rest of your way now wait a minute did I say that again he didn't say I'm going to show you the rest of your way. He said, I am the way. Do you know in Mark's gospel with 16 chapters, there's a word that occurs in every chapter of the earliest gospel written. It's the word way.

13:26 Chapter one through 16, every chapter, Jesus is on the way. I think there's a reason that he's the same Lord who said I am the way we want to know what's around the next corner and he says no let me tell you one reason he does that if you knew what was around the next corner you wouldn't go now what if God had said now Abraham here's the agenda first of all after you leave Ur your 205 year old father's going to die that's going to change the family then you're going to walk south and when you get to the land I promised you here's the next announcement there's going to be a famine and you won't have anything to eat oh then you're going to go to Egypt and you're going to lie to Pharaoh about your beautiful wife Sarah and that's going to create trouble. Then you're going to come back and you're going to have a fight with your nephew lot about who gets the best real estate. By the time God told Abraham that Abe would have said, thank you. I'm going to stay right here in her. Is anybody tracking with me here?

14:40 It's a mercy that God doesn't give you the whole agenda and says, get your eye off the road and own me. I think about it. I surrendered. We used to say it that way. I surrendered to preach when I was 16 years old. I was a sophomore in high school. I remember it. And I remember it vividly. I've told you about it. A June night, teenage vacation Bible school. I get up, walk down the aisle, Connell Baptist Church, 4736 Price, Fort Worth, Texas, 76701. I go down and say, God's called me to preach. I didn't have a clue. what the next half century would be like. And if I had, I would have gone back to my seat. It's a mercy that God doesn't tell you about things you're not ready to face until you've walked with him.

15:43 Here's the three mistakes people make about the way. You might want to note these. First of all, you want somebody else's way. Some of us spend a good deal of our life in faith saying, I want that person's way. Secondly, you let somebody else pull you off your way. They lead you on a detour. and third you just stop incarcerated in your own inertia stultified in your own stagnation you just stop walking with him I want somebody please under the spirit of God this morning to make a decision to get back on the way at the end of World War II a navigator took off in a plane from the west coast Now, think about this.

16:43 When he took off, his primitive navigation instrument was off one degree, even though he didn't know it. Now, if you're off one degree when you take off, and you're going to land on a little island out in the Pacific, what happens the further you go? The further you go, the further you are off. and when Rickenbacker dropped beneath the clouds to land instead of landing where he was supposed to he had to ditch his plane because he was one degree off when he left there's one somebody here this morning who's one degree off the life of faith and I want to plead with you and exhort you that the further you go the further off you're going to get walk with him even though you don't know next where but wait a minute take another look what's the journey it's not only going with him without knowing where it's waiting on him without knowing when did you see this down here it's in verse 9 by faith he dwelt in the land of promises in a foreign country dwelling in tents there's an interesting word there it's a fascinating word the word that is used is a word that means a permanent resident alien in the land that god had promised him a lot of concern in our nation now aren't there about resident aliens here the word that's used for Abraham is that he had to wait on God in the very land that God had promised him not knowing when he would get it I don't know how good you are at waiting I'm trying to get better People who study the thing say the average citizen of the United States waits 32 minutes

18:55 a day in traffic. I bet you wait more than that here in Houston probably. Across a year, we average 28 minutes a day in security lanes. The next one didn't bless me very much. We, on the average, wait on hold on the telephone 13 hours a year.

19:17 38 hours tied up in traffic. This one didn't bless me. 58 hours at red lights. Some of us are not good at waiting. If I'd been Abraham and walked out into the desert with God without knowing where, every morning I would have been asking God, When? See, he was a man with a problem and a promise. He'd been promised a land. He'd been promised a son. He was too old to have a child. And so was Sarah. I expect every morning that 75-year-old mess of payment to look up and say, When? When will you give me this land? Lord, I'm 80. When?

19:56 No land, no sun. Lord, I'm 90. Been walking around 15 years. Lord, I'm 95. I'm 96. 97, 98 and when he was 99 God finally said now and Isaac was born. waiting.

20:22 I wonder what you're asking, God. Everybody here is waiting for something. Lord, when will I find out what you want me to do with my life? When will I find out with whom you want me to spend my life? When will I find out where I live? When will I find out what the degree would be, what the job will be? The nature of human life is to look up and say when. Now please hear me. just as God wants you to look off of the road and up to him, he wants you to look off the clock and up to the clouds. The when belongs to him.

21:02 Abraham spent a hundred years walking, waiting for God to say, now. may be the hardest thing you deal with. Waiting for God's time. Heaven's time. My hometown's Fort Worth, Texas. The most famous citizen in the history of the town was a man named Amon G. Carter, self-made Texas. A guy owned the first TV station in Texas. First radio station. He was a character. he built the Fort Worth Club downtown Fort Worth put the first elevator in that building first elevator downtown in his biography Eamon G when the elevator was slow one day he got mad and shot the elevator he carried a sidearm Eamon G said this thing's too slow he shot the elevator that's impatience I think about it in my own life God has said to me so many times Joel wait wait on me there's an oxymoron in this verse it says he settled down in tents the word in the Greek New Testament said he settled down permanently in tents with Isaac and Jacob if you've ever lived in a tent you know that that's what you don't do in a tent is settle down permanently I lived one time for a month in a tent down on South Padre.

22:37 I was the camp cook, and there was sand in everything. There was sand in the bacon, sand in the eggs. It gave a whole new meaning to the word sandwich. This literally means he's settled down to a life of permanent impermanence, waiting for God to say when. But then again, there's two kinds of waiting. And waiting in faith is the kind of waiting that an expectant mother has, waiting for a baby to come. The kind of waiting that a vigilant guard has, waiting to be relieved. the kind of waiting that a lover has, waiting in anticipation for the beloved. It's not passive waiting, it's active waiting, waiting to see what God is going to do. Passive waiting gives up, passive waiting despairs, passive waiting throws up its hands and says, I give up.

23:34 To wait on God is to wait with active anticipation. This summer, incredibly to me, the 50th anniversary of Neil Armstrong and Baz Aldrin. I don't know if you saw it. There were three one-hour documentaries, and it brought all that back to my mind. If you're of a certain age, you remember the world holding its breath. But I remember two times in that when the world held its breath with a particular intensity. You see, as they were circling behind the moon, that tiny capsule lost radio contact.

24:20 Nobody knew what was going to happen because they had to fire their rocket at exactly the right time or they'd never get back. I remember in front of that little TV screen, breath abated, heart pounding, my eyes wide open, everyone waiting to hear that crackling static when they came around from behind the moon. In fact, what they said was Houston.

24:53 He found out. They got out of it. This is the second time. When that tiny capsule went 23,000 miles an hour through the atmosphere and there was the potential that it would burn up with friction, they lost radio contact and you didn't know whether they burned up or not until they almost hit the water. And then that word came, didn't it? Crackling static. Houston, we made it. I've been thinking about that, living through that again, watching those. That lower, lesser, lighter human story leads me to a higher, holier, heavier truth. How many times in my life have I had to look up to the heavens and wait for His Word, wait for His promise, wait until a word came from beyond and told me the next thing on the agenda. I tell you this, if you're going to live a life of faith, you're going to go without knowing where, but you're also going to wait for him to tell you the next word he has for you.

26:05 Let's sit down. One other thing. This is the hardest of all for Abe and for us, I think. Faith enables you not only to go without knowing where and wait without knowing when, it enables you to believe God knows how to do it even when you don't know how. Oh, Abe was a man with a promise and a problem. It's almost a funny story, really. You remember the angel showed up there at the oaks of Mamre. Sarah was in her tent, and those three visitors said, Abe, you're going to have a baby. It's a funny story. What did Sarah do? What did she do inside the tent? Ha!

26:47 Laugh. It was funny. I wonder about those 318 servants that had to walk around. They didn't have any choice. When he left Haram, they had to go with him. They already thought the old man had lost his mind. We're out here in the middle of nowhere, and he doesn't know where he's going. What do you think they thought when he got them all together and said, we're going to walk around out here until Sarah and I have a baby? They said, the old man has lost his mind. He's gone crazy. We're going to die out here.

27:17 But you know what? God got the last laugh. Because out of that tent of Sarah one night came the cry of baby Isaac, and those 318 servants fell on their face and said, Crete is the God of Abraham. And in the loins of that baby Isaac was the very DNA that was in the humanity of our Lord Jesus Christ. God knows how. Nearly everybody in here is facing some difficult how.

27:53 You came in here with a question mark over your head. How? How can I break the habit that has me in its grip? How can I go next where he will? How can I save this marriage? How can I live with this disease? How? The essence of faith is believing he knows how when you do not know how. we've heard of sacred cows there's also sacred house you need to turn that over to him and say God I don't know how but you do you see God wants you to get your eye off the road and on him off the clock and on him and a lot of us think we've got a manual in life that will tell us immediately how.

28:52 No, you've got to get your eye off the manual and look at the one who wrote it and recognize he's worthy of my trust on this journey. We're not here today because we worship Abraham. I've been to his tomb. You can go to his tomb in Hebron. You can stand there. where he and Sarah and Isaac and Rebecca and Joseph, Leah, are buried.

29:27 But that old man is looking toward you from 4,000 years ago. And incidentally, he's still living. Jesus said, God's not the God of the dead, but of the... But Jesus also said, before Abraham was, I am. And Jesus also said, Abraham rejoiced to see my... day. You don't come to this church because we were Father Abraham. You come because of the greater descendant of Abraham who 2,000 years ago, halfway back to Abraham, took on human flesh and told his followers, I am the way. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God.

30:32 I spoke in the Word of God to you today. God's way for you is to turn to that greater son of Abraham. Our Lord Jesus Christ, who today enables you by the power of his death, burial, and resurrection, by his indwelling presence in your life, to go without knowing where, to wait on him without knowing when and to believe that God knows how even when you don't. Now here's the appeal this morning. Somebody here has never yet one time put your foot in his footprints, got up, stood out, and made the journey by starting down this aisle a journey that will lead to the rest of your life saying I'm going with you even though I don't know where.

31:37 But there's somebody else here who's one degree off. You know life is just a little bit off. if I were to sit down and ask you at your kitchen table, how's that working for you? I doubt it's working well. You need to get back on the journey. Or if you don't have a church home in this city, come journey with these people. God is telling somebody right now, pack up and go. God bless you.