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Scripture Reading: Rom. 4:3, 17-22; Gal. 4:23-26, 28; Gen. 15—16:4a, 15-16
The matter of Canaan was settled for Abraham, but from Genesis 15, we see the matter of his son. This does not mean that Canaan is no longer an issue after chapter fifteen. It only means that the focus is no longer on Canaan, but on the seed.
Genesis 15:1 says, "After these things the word of the Lord came unto Abram in a vision, saying, Fear not, Abram: I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward."
It was very meaningful for God to reassure Abraham with such a word even though he had just come back from a victory. We have to realize that Abraham was only a man, and his victory was the victory of a man; it was not a superhuman victory. Although God granted him a victory, He did not make him superhuman. It was easy for Abraham to refuse the riches of Sodom when he had the enjoyment of the bread and the wine from Melchizedek; it was easy for him to deny everything then. But after the moment of victory, when the excitement and uproar were over, and when he began to contemplate in his tent, he would undoubtedly worry about how he had offended the four kings by saving Lot, and how he had offended the king of Sodom by declining his goods. It was unavoidable for him to have some fear. We can detect this from God's word to Abraham. God always has a reason when He speaks. God said, "Fear not," because Abraham was afraid. God gave him two reasons to not fear: (1) "I am thy shield;" no one could attack him anymore. (2) "I am...thy exceeding great reward"; therefore, whatever Abraham lost he could find in Him. God was comforting Abraham.
Verse 2 says, "And Abram said, Lord God, what wilt thou give me, seeing I go childless, and the steward of my house is this Eliezer of Damascus?" Abraham told the Lord that his problem was not that simple. It seemed as if he turned the question back to the Lord: "Lord, don't You know?" The Lord likes to hear us speak. On the one hand, the Lord wants us to fear Him. On the other hand, He likes to hear us speak. When God speaks, we listen. When we speak, God listens. Abraham was telling God that his problem was not one of goods, but of a son. The matter of Canaan had been settled. Now there was the problem of a son. He said, "What wilt thou give me, seeing I go childless, and the steward of my house is this Eliezer of Damascus?" This man from Damascus was not begotten of him; he was not Abraham's son. Although Abraham had heard God say, "I will make of thee a great nation" and "I will make thy seed as the dust of the earth," and although the matter of Canaan was settled, he still had no son!
God is teaching us a lesson here. Does He not know everything? Did He not know Abraham's need for a son? Yes, God knows, but He likes to see us being His friends. He wants us to enter into His heart and His mind, and He wants us to speak to Him this way. Abraham entered into God's mind in this way. God had promised him a son, but He wanted Abraham to ask for it himself. Abraham was saying that if God wanted a nation, He had to give him a son, and the son had to be born of his own house, rather than from somewhere else. The nation had to be brought in through one begotten of him, not through one bought by him. The nation should belong to his sons, not to his servants. Abraham realized that none of his three hundred eighteen trained servants nor Eliezer of Damascus could solve this problem. He needed someone begotten of him. Only someone begotten of him could solve the problem. This was what he meant when he spoke with God. Abraham was indeed a friend of God! He had entered into God's heart! Without a son, the land would have been vain and the promise would have been useless to Abraham! Without a son he could have never received the blessings. This realization was a result of God's work in Abraham.
After Abraham spoke, God did not immediately answer. He allowed Abraham to go on speaking. God is a God who is very good at listening. Verse 3 says, "And Abram said, Behold, to me thou hast given no seed: and, lo, one born in my house is mine heir."
Verses 4 through 6 say, "And, behold, the word of the Lord came unto him, saying, This shall not be thine heir; but he that shall come forth out of thine own bowels shall be thine heir. And he brought him forth abroad, and said, Look now toward heaven, and tell the stars, if thou be able to number them: and he said unto him, So shall thy seed be. And he believed in the Lord; and he counted it to him for righteousness." This is the first time the Bible speaks of faith. Abraham is the father of faith. He believed God's word in a definite way, and God counted it to him for righteousness.
God told Abraham, "He that shall come forth out of thine own bowels shall be thine heir." This shows us that God's goal is not achieved through the many people He has gathered, but through those whom He has begotten. Those who are not begotten of God do not count; they cannot fulfill God's purpose. God's eternal purpose is fulfilled through those whom He has begotten.
God asked Abraham if he could count the stars in heaven and told him that his descendants would be as numerous as the stars. Abraham believed in God, and God counted it to him for righteousness. As we have mentioned previously, God first had to work on one person and gain something in him before He could gain something through many others. In order for God to have many believers, He first had to gain one believer. Abraham believed in God, and God counted it to him for righteousness.
We have to pay attention to the following words: "And he said unto him, I am the Lord that brought thee out of Ur of the Chaldees, to give thee this land to inherit it. And he said, Lord God, whereby shall I know that I shall inherit it?" (Gen. 15:7-8). In the beginning God said to him, "I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward." But Abraham said to the Lord, "I go childless." God then told him that only he who came forth out of his own bowels would be his heir, and that his seed would be as the stars in heaven. Then he asked God for more proof. He wanted to know how he could be assured that the land would be his inheritance. Abraham believed God's promise, and God acknowledged his faith. His question was not a indication of unbelief, but a request for a sign for his faith. In answering this question, God shows the believers His way of reaching His goal.
How did God answer him? Verses 9 and 10 say, "And he said unto him, Take me a heifer of three years old, and a she goat of three years old, and a ram of three years old, and a turtledove, and a young pigeon. And he took unto him all these, and divided them in the midst, and laid each piece one against another: but the birds divided he not." Verse 12 says, "And when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram; and, lo, a horror of great darkness fell upon him." Verses 17 and 18 say, "And it came to pass, that, when the sun went down, and it was dark, behold a smoking furnace, and a burning lamp that passed between those pieces. In that same day the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying, Unto thy seed have I given this land, from the river of Egypt unto the great river, the river Euphrates." This was God's answer.
Abraham "divided them in the midst, and laid each piece one against another...behold a smoking furnace, and a burning lamp that passed between those pieces." This is the proof. It is a picture of the way of the cross. What does it mean to divide "in the midst"? To divide in the midst is to die; it is the cross. What does it mean to pass "between the pieces"? To pass "between the pieces" is to die, which also means to pass through the cross. God showed Abraham that his inheritance of the land was based on the work of the cross, and that his seed was able to stand in this land through the death of the cross.
We have to realize that the cross is the foundation of all spiritual living. Without passing through the cross, we cannot live for God on this earth. Even if we can give a message on the cross, it will not produce any spiritual effect unless we are first dealt with by the cross. Only those who have passed through the cross will have the smoking furnace and the burning lamp. In other words, only those who have passed through death will have the purging, cleansing, and genuine light.
The problem with many people is that whenever they find themselves with a little power or a little achievement in the work, they think that they are useful in God's hand. Actually, there is not such a thing. The whole matter depends on the kind of substance you bring into the Lord's work. If you bring something of yourself into the work, you have failed already. You have not failed because you cannot speak, you are not powerful enough, or you are not familiar enough with the Scripture. You have failed because you are the wrong person. The cross has not done its work in you. We have to be clear that only those who have passed through the cross will inherit the land. Those who have not passed through death will not inherit the land. We need the purifying work. How difficult it is to be pure in the Lord's work! What does it mean to be pure? To be pure means to be without any mixture. In our work for the Lord, how easy it is to say one word in the spirit and the next word in the flesh. How easy it is to say one word by the Lord and the next word by ourselves. This is mixture, and this is impurity. Consequently, we need the Lord to bring a smoking furnace to pass through the pieces in order to conduct a purifying work in us. The efficacy of the death of Christ will make us a pure person. The Lord does not want us to be a mixed person. He wants to purge us so that we may be pure.
What passed through the pieces was not only a smoking furnace but also a burning lamp. Before there is the smoking furnace, there must first be the cross, and before there is the burning lamp, there must also be the cross. Hence, in order to have real light, one must first pass through death. A person who has not passed through death may be very clever and knowledgeable; others may think that his words are very intelligent. But such a person does not possess any piercing light. The burning lamp, the genuine light, comes from the cross. It comes from the act of passing through the pieces, that is, from passing through death. No one can fulfill the ministry of God's work based on his human wisdom or knowledge. In order to fulfill such a ministry, one must have the experience of the cross before the Lord. It is easy to preach the doctrine of the cross, but these verses show us that only those who know and experience the cross can stand for God.
After Abraham divided everything in the midst and laid each piece one against another, he fell asleep. Suddenly a great darkness fell upon him. A person who does not know the cross will think that he is more than qualified to work for the Lord and that there is nothing to be fearful of, but a person who knows the cross will see great darkness falling upon him. He will realize that he can do nothing and that he is totally incapable of doing anything by himself. When a person is brought by the Lord to the place of weakness and when he feels that he cannot do anything and is not worthy of doing anything, he can begin to work for the Lord. When we truly see that this work is the Lord's work and that we are useless and when we truly see the Lord's holiness and our filthiness, the Lord will begin to use us.
How did Abraham inherit the land? God showed him that he had to pass through death; he had to pass through the cross. Only by going through the way of the cross will we inherit the land, and only then will we be able to live for God continuously on this earth.
Genesis 15:5 says, "And he brought him forth abroad, and said, Look now toward heaven, and tell the stars, if thou be able to number them: and he said unto him, So shall thy seed be." The word "seed" refers to his descendant. It is singular, not plural, in number. This is very strange because humanly speaking, if his descendants were to be as numerous as the stars in heaven, "seed" should have been plural. But when God was telling Abraham of the multiplicity of his descendants, He used the word "seed" in the singular. Why does He use the singular form of the word? Who was the one seed? In Galatians 3:16, Paul said, "He does not say, 'And to the seeds,' as concerning many, but as concerning one: 'And to your seed,' who is Christ." Hence, the seed that God referred to was not many people, but one person. This person was not Isaac, but Christ.
This shows us that the One who inherits the land is the one seed. As far as Abraham was concerned, the seed was Isaac. But in a wider context, the seed is Christ. Isaac was just a shadow; the substance is Christ. In other words, Christ will inherit the land and bless the earth. Both power and authority are with Christ. God's work of recovery is carried out by Christ, not by Isaac.
The matter of sonship is very important. If this matter of sonship and the seed is not settled, no one can carry out God's recovery work. If Abraham was not brought to the point of perfection, he could not have brought in Isaac. Abraham first had to become a vessel before Isaac could be brought in. This means that the glorious Christ will be brought in only when a group of people believe as Abraham believed; only then will God's work be accomplished. Isaac was merely a shadow; the reality is Christ. In the same way, Abraham was a shadow; the reality is the church. Just as Abraham became a vessel to bring in Isaac, so the church is a vessel to bring in the glorious Christ.
God wanted Abraham to become a vessel to bring in Isaac. The descendants of Abraham will fulfill God's purpose; Abraham himself did not fulfill God's purpose. Hence, the church is nothing in itself. What is important is that the church brings in Christ and expresses Christ on earth for the recovery of all God's work on earth. Abraham was a vessel to bring in Isaac. Today the church is a vessel to bring in Christ.
It is not a simple thing to usher in Isaac. Abraham had to be tested. In order for us to be God's vessel, bring in Christ, and express His authority, there must be many tests. After Genesis 15, the Bible shows us that Abraham was tested three times concerning his son just as he was tested three times concerning the land of Canaan. Two of these tests occurred before the birth of his son, and one occurred after his birth. All three tests prepared Abraham for the ushering in of Isaac. In other words, the church must be tested and prepared before it can bring back the glorious Christ to the earth.
Chapter fifteen tells us that Abraham said to the Lord, "God, what wilt thou give me, seeing I go childless, and the steward of my house is this Eliezer of Damascus?" God said, "He that shall come forth out of thine own bowels shall be thine heir." Abraham believed in God, and God counted it to him for righteousness. The promise of begetting a son was there, and the faith was there. However, day after day, there was no son. Month after month, there was no son, and year after year, there was no son. This shows us that faith has to be tested. Abraham's faith grew step by step.
Genesis 16:1 says, "Now Sarai, Abram's wife, bare him no children." He was now eighty-five years old. His wife Sarah could not bare him a son. What should he do? At that juncture, his wife said to him, "Behold now, the Lord hath restrained me from bearing: I pray thee, go in unto my maid; it may be that I may obtain children by her" (v. 2). What did Abraham do? "Abram hearkened to the voice of Sarai. And Sarai, Abram's wife, took Hagar her maid the Egyptian..and gave her to her husband" (vv. 2-3). The Bible specifically says that "Abram had dwelt ten years in the land of Canaan" (v. 3). When Abraham first arrived in Canaan, God promised, "Unto thy seed will I give this land" (12:7). Just before these events God promised him again, "He that shall come forth out of thine own bowels shall be thine heir." By the time he was eighty-five years old, however, he still had no son. He became anxious. In order to have a son, he went in unto Hagar as his concubine. Hagar became pregnant and brought forth Ishmael. The Bible specifically says, "And Abram was fourscore and six years old, when Hagar bare Ishmael to Abram" (16:16).
This is a great matter. God ordained that Abraham would beget a son, but His ordination was for Abraham to beget a son through Sarah and that he would beget him at the age of one hundred. However, Abraham shortened the time by fourteen years with his own effort. Moreover, the son was begotten through Hagar. This was the first test that Abraham faced concerning his son.
He believed in God's word. He believed that God would give him a son. Yet he did not realize that believing meant to stop his own activities and wait on God's work! As soon as we believe, we should stop our own work. Hebrews 4:10 says, "For he who has entered into His rest has himself also rested from his works, as God did from His own." When we believe, we should not make haste. Whenever we believe, we should be at rest. Abraham believed in God, yet he did not learn his lesson. He did not see that if he had believed, he should have waited and should not have done anything by himself. He thought that in order to believe, he should help God and do something by himself. Consequently, he accepted his wife's word, took Hagar to be his concubine, and bore Ishmael. Abraham gave God a hand! He thought that since God had promised a son, he would fulfill God's will by doing this! He did not do anything else. All he did was act on his own concerning something that God had promised him. But this one act brought about his failure!
It was not a question of whether Abraham should have a son. It was a question of through whom the son should be begotten. God's heart could not be satisfied with Abraham just having a son. The son of Abraham had to be begotten through Sarah before God's heart could be satisfied. This was the point of contention between God and Abraham.
This is also a point that confuses many Christians today. Many people ask, "Is it wrong for me to preach the truth?" God's Word says that we should testify and preach the gospel. These things are good. But God is concerned with who is doing the work. Who is doing the preaching? It is right to beget sons, but the real question is who is begetting them. God's emphasis is not on whether something has happened, but on what the source is. Often our attention is just on the correctness of the results and the forms. Whatever we think is correct is taken to be correct, and whatever we think is right is taken to be right. However, God is concerned with where something comes from and who is doing it. It is not enough to say that something is the will of God. One must still ask who is fulfilling this will. It is God's will to have a son, but who is going to give birth to this son in order to fulfill His will? If the begetting is done through one's self-effort, the result is Ishmael.
God intended that Abraham be the father. Therefore, He did a special work on him in order to show him what it means for God to be the Father. For God to be the Father means that everything should issue from God. If Abraham did not see that everything issued from God and that He is the Father, he would not have been qualified to be the father of many nations. Yet the begetting of Ishmael issued from Abraham himself and was not from God.
The greatest test to God's children is in the choosing of the source for their work. Many of God's children often say that such and such a thing is "good," "right," or "according to God's will." But behind these "good" and "right" things that are "according to God's will," the self is doing all the work, and there is no realization of the cross and no ground given to God to deal with the fleshly life. Under these conditions they do God's will by performing many so-called good and right things. The result is not Isaac, but Ishmael. We have to ask God to speak to us and show us who is actually doing these things. This is the critical issue. We may work in a certain place, labor diligently, and save many souls, but in the final analysis, the number of souls that are saved and the appearance of the work are not important. Whether we have done something by God or by ourselves is what is important. The most regrettable thing that we can do is to teach God's Word, preach God's truth, and exercise God's gift by ourselves. If we have done this, we should bow down our head and confess our sins. We have to realize that the works done "for His sake," which are not of Him, and which are done without recognizing Him as the Father, have no spiritual value at all. God must bring us to such a point. Whether or not our spiritual work is pure depends on how much of the work comes out of God and how much of it comes out of the self.
Since Abraham wanted a son, he should have realized that God is the Father and should have allowed Him to be the Father, laying himself aside. Abraham wanted Isaac, but he should not have tried to beget him by himself. In other words, if we want Christ to inherit the land and if we want to stand for God, we should not try to bring Him in by ourselves. We should not act or do anything by ourselves. We have to put ourselves aside. This is the greatest and hardest test. This is where God's servants most frequently fail. We must remember that God's work must not only be free from sin, it must be free from our own efforts as well. God is not only asking how well a work is done, but who is doing the work. Unfortunately, it is easy to exhort men to forsake sin, but it is not easy to exhort men to forsake self-effort. May God bring us to the point where we can say to the Lord, "I want to do Your will! You are within me and You must enable me to do Your will. I am not here to do Your will by myself! It must be You, not I!"
We must remember that "My thoughts are not your thoughts,/And your ways are not My ways, declares Jehovah. /For as the heavens are higher than the earth,/So are My ways higher than your ways,/And My thoughts higher than your thoughts" (Isa. 55:8-9). Therefore, anything we do by ourselves, even though it may be good in our eyes, cannot satisfy God's heart. Even carrying out His will by ourselves will not satisfy His heart. The only thing that will satisfy His heart is that which is done by Himself alone. Although He has lowered Himself and is willing to use us, we have to remember that we are merely servants whom He uses as vessels in His hand. We cannot replace Him in anything. We can only allow God to work through us; we cannot do anything by ourselves. Eventually, Isaac was born of Abraham, but Isaac was the son born according to God's promise. It was God who caused Isaac to be born. God begot this son through Abraham. The principle of promise is totally different from the principle of Ishmael. May the Lord be merciful to us and deliver us from the principle of Ishmael.
Abraham married Hagar and begot Ishmael. Galatians 4 says that "the one of the maidservant was born according to the flesh..from Mount Sinai, bringing forth children unto slavery, which is Hagar. Now this Hagar is Sinai the mountain in Arabia.." (vv. 23-25). In other words, Hagar represents the law. What is the law? The law represents God's demand. The Ten Commandments represent God's demands on man. God wants this and He wants that. What does it mean to keep the law? Keeping the law means giving something to God and pleasing God.
But Galatians 3:10 says, "Cursed is everyone who does not continue in all the things written in the book of the law to do them." In other words, those who say, "I will please God," are cursed. Why are they cursed? It is because man cannot please God by himself, and he is not qualified to please God (Rom. 8:7-8). In the Bible the law is frequently mentioned in conjunction with the flesh. Romans 7 is a chapter particularly on the law. It is also a chapter particularly on the flesh. What is the flesh? Simply put, the flesh is self-effort; the flesh is the self. Whenever we try to keep the law, we are in the flesh. Whenever man tries to please God by his own effort, the law comes. A person who tries to please God with the fleshly strength is one with whom God is not pleased. This is what Hagar and Ishmael represent. Hagar represents the law, while Ishmael represents the resulting flesh.
Abraham was a believer. He tried to please God and fulfill God's goal. God wanted him to have a son, and he tried to have a son by himself. Was this not according to God's will, and did he not do it to please God? Could it be wrong? However, Paul said, "The one of the maidservant was born according to the flesh." It is true that God's will should be done. But the question is who should be the one to do His will. If we try to do His will by ourselves, the result is Ishmael. Abraham was wrong, not in his goal but in his source. His goal was to see God's promise being fulfilled, but he was wrong to fulfill it by his own strength.
Now we are clear. Not only will God reject those who do things that are not pleasing to Him. He will reject even those who do things that are pleasing to Him, but who do them according to themselves. We will not please God if we sin, and neither will we please God if we try to do good by our flesh. Whether or not we please God depends on whether the cross has done its work in dealing with our flesh and the natural life. Are we saying, "God, I cannot do anything, and I am not qualified to do anything; I can only look to You"? A person who truly believes in God is one who does not act according to his flesh. God is the Master of the work. The thing that offends God the most is usurping His place in the work. This is often where our mistake lies. We cannot believe, we cannot trust, and we cannot wait. We cannot commit everything to God. This is the root of our offense against God.
God ordained that Abraham would beget a son through Sarah. Galatians 4:23 tells us that "the one of the free woman was born through promise." The free woman was Sarah. Hagar represents the law, while Sarah represents grace. What is the difference between law and grace? Doing things by ourselves is law, while grace is God doing things for us. Simply put, grace is God doing everything for us. If we are doing it, it is not grace. Only when God is doing it for us is it grace. Grace, as defined in the Bible, is not forbearance or tolerance, nor is it doing anything by ourselves. It is something specific that God does in us. The specific work God wanted to do in Abraham was begetting Isaac through Sarah. Isaac was to be begotten of Abraham, but he was to be begotten through grace and through God's promise.
Genesis 16 says that Abraham begot Ishmael when he was eighty-six years old. At that time his fleshly energy and natural strength still existed. This is why Galatians 4 says that Ishmael was born of the flesh. Genesis 21 tells us that by the time Abraham begot Isaac, he was already a hundred years old (v. 5). Romans 4 tells us that when he was about a hundred years old, Abraham considered his own body as already dead and Sarah's womb as being deadened (v. 19). In other words, his fleshly energy and natural strength were gone. Abraham did not have any more strength to beget a son, and neither did Sarah. God chose this time for Isaac to be born. This means that God wanted Abraham to consider himself as a dying, and even dead, person so that he could trust in the God who gives life to the dead and calls the things not being as being. God's intention was for Abraham to realize that he was not the Father. It is very interesting that God wanted him to be a father, yet at the same time, He wanted him to see that he was not the Father. He waited until all the natural energy of Abraham was gone before He gave him Isaac.
This is the kind of work that God wants to perform in us. He is always waiting. Even if it means waiting for fourteen years, He will still wait. He is waiting for the day when we realize that we cannot make it, and when we see ourselves as good as dead. Then we will beget Isaac. He cannot use us today because our time has not come. God is after not only the accomplishment of His will, but an accomplishment that issues from Him. If we only have doctrines and knowledge and have never been brought to the point where we tell Him, "I am through, I am dead, and I cannot make it," He cannot use us, and we cannot beget Isaac or fulfill His goal.
One very important condition for begetting Isaac is the matter of time. The Lord cannot really use us and we cannot really manifest Christ or uphold God's testimony on earth until we are a hundred years old. This is the time when everything about us is finished. Before that day arrives, every work that we do by ourselves is Ishmael.
The question now is whether we want Ishmael or Isaac. It is easy to beget Ishmael; if we are like Hagar, we can beget Ishmael at any time. It is easy to do things through Hagar. If we are like Hagar, there is no need for us to wait, but if we would be like Sarah, there is a need for us to wait. In begetting Ishmael, one does not need to wait. But in order to beget Isaac, there is the need of waiting. One has to wait for God's promise, for His timing, and for Him to do the work. Those who cannot wait for God to work, who will not allow God to work, and who do not have God working for them will stretch out their own hands to seize Ishmael. Those who want to have Isaac must wait on God. The day will come when we cannot do anything by ourselves, when we are not able to do anything, are not capable of anything, and are completely through in ourselves. That will be the day when Christ will be fully manifested in us and God's goal will be fulfilled. Before that time, everything that we do by ourselves will have no spiritual value; rather, it will be harmful. In spiritual work it is not a matter of how much we do, but a matter of how much we have gained of the Lord's work. In spiritual matters, God's work and man's work are two entirely different things. There is a vast difference between the value of God's work and the value of man's work. Only that which comes out of Him has any spiritual value. Anything that does not come out of Him has no spiritual value.
What then is Ishmael? Ishmael is anything born prematurely. It is doing things by oneself. We can say that Ishmael includes two characteristics: the first is a wrong source, and the second is a premature timing. In spiritual things nothing tests us more than the matter of time. It often does not take much for our flesh to be exposed. All that God needs to do is put us aside for three months, and our flesh will not be able to stand it. But God will never be pleased to see an Ishmael before His time. Even if we can say a few words or do a few things, and even if these things appear to be of God, He will not be pleased with them. God's goal must be achieved according to God's time and through God's power. This is the principle of Isaac — a principle of God's time and God's power.
Romans 4:19-22 says, "And not weakening in his faith, he considered his own body as already dead, being about a hundred years old, as well as the deadening of Sarah's womb; but with regard to the promise of God, he did not doubt in unbelief, but was empowered by faith, giving glory to God and being fully persuaded that what He had promised He was able also to do. Therefore also it was accounted to him as righteousness."
We should note that Abraham's justification by faith in these verses is different in time from that spoken of in Romans 4:3, which says, "Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him as righteousness." This is Paul's quotation of Genesis 15:6. It refers to the time before Abraham was eighty-five years old. At that time God spoke to Abraham in a vision: "He that shall come forth out of thine own bowels shall be thine heir." God also brought Abraham forth abroad and asked him to look toward heaven and number the stars and said to him, "So shall thy seed be." Abraham believed in God, and God counted it to him for righteousness. This was the first justification. Although Abraham believed, his faith was not perfect, and later he begot Ishmael by his own flesh. The words "it was accounted to him as righteousness" in Romans 4:22 refer to the incident in Genesis 17. At that time he was ninety-nine years old. Although he considered his own body as being already dead and his wife's womb as being deadened, he did not doubt in unbelief. He fully believed that God would fulfill what He had promised. This was accounted to him as righteousness. Hence, this was a further justification by faith. There was a time lapse of over ten years, but God was still teaching Abraham the same lesson — the lesson of faith. At the beginning, there was Abraham's own element in his faith. After many years he had entirely lost hope in himself, but he was still able to believe. God counted him as righteous based on his faith. God had brought him to the point where he truly believed. This was the result of God's work in him. This shows us that it is not of him who wills, nor of him who runs, but of God who shows mercy (Rom. 9:16). He is the One who initiates the work, and He is the One who carries out the work. May the Lord be merciful to us. May He help us learn the lesson of faith, and may we look to Him alone!
