Scripture References: Genesis 14:17-22 (NLT); Genesis 14:23-24 (NLT); Genesis 15:1-2; 4-9, 13-16 (NLT); Genesis 15:17-21 (NLT); Hebrews 6:17-20 (NLT); Hebrews 7:1-3 (NLT); Genesis 22:1-19 (AMPC); Genesis 24:1-8 (AMPC); Genesis 24:24-25, 28, 35, 50-51(AMPC); Genesis 25:5, 11, 20-23 (AMPC).
Praise You, Jesus. Praise You, Jesus. We love You, Lord. We love You, Father. We praise Your holy name. Your name is above every other name. It’s the most beautiful name. It’s the most beautiful name. Thank You, Jesus. We are forever thankful and grateful that You came to earth, that You lived as a man, that You died for us, that You obeyed the will of the Father so completely. We are so forever grateful, Jesus. Thank You, Heavenly Father. Thank You, Holy Spirit, that we can trust in Your guidance, Your leading and Your direction in our lives and in this service this morning. We thank You, Lord. And I pray that You bless the ears of the hearers and bless the hearts of the hearers this morning. In Jesus’ name. Hallelujah. And everybody said? Amen.
You may be seated.
Hallelujah. Praise the Lord. It’s a good morning to be in church. In fact, it’s so good to be in church, you know, that we should have church every day of the week. That will be a thing, hey? That will be a thing. When do we start? Praise the Lord. Praise Jesus.
I’ve been speaking to you for some time about how words, soil, seed, choices have impacted our lives from the beginning and how they continue to impact our lives. So this morning I’m going to address something that’s going to take us to Jacob’s constellation, but I want to say to you that, when you read in the Bible that God cursed or a father or somebody cursed somebody, you know, we tend to have this very negative thing about cursing and this negative connotation to cursing, you know, is often associated with foul language and just bad words and bad stuff that comes out of people’s mouths, you know. Well, for the most part if you read about cursing in the Old Testament, if a curse is given, it’s just words that are spoken that are ensuring the consequence of a decision. So, the consequence of the decision means this is what your life is going to look like. It’s a statement of fact that will come into being. So when it talks about a curse, it’s a statement of fact that is going to become evident as life, as you lead life. If you take the same principle and you apply it to a blessing, then a blessing is because of your choice, the declaration is a statement of fact that is going to, you’re going to see as you live your life, on the positive side. So if you’re cursed or you’re blessed, it’s a statement, words that have got power that God oversees those words to make sure that it comes to pass. Amen.
So, if I, if I want to just recap for a minute I think I would like to say this. (I’ve got a bit of a pop on my sound here this morning. Is there a way we can do away with this pop? There shouldn’t be a pop on here, but it’s distracting me. So…praise the Lord.) So if I have to really just briefly review what is, what is, what I have been saying, and I wanted to be talking about Jacob’s constellation with you, but I felt led of the Lord that I’ve got to go back and I’ve got to start a long way back so that we can get a proper framework when I talk about Jacob’s constellation and today you are going to begin to see how it all really comes together.
So when God put man on the earth, He put him there, created the earth, everything happened on the earth because He spoke words. So there was power in God, the will of God was spoken out of words. So the will of God, with the words that He spoke, released His power to make it all come to pass. So when man, Adam, had a, didn’t listen to God’s words, he listened to someone else’s words, he made a choice that these words sounded better to him, because of something that happened in him where he wanted to express his will as God. So he didn’t any more want to just receive the words to be like God, he wanted to be as God. So when he heard those words he acted on those words. When God came to Adam, what did He do? He spoke another set of words. And the words that He spoke were, “From this day onwards you can’t live in this garden. You can’t have this glory that you had before. You are now going to have to work with the sweat of your brow and with the labor and toil of your life you are going to have to bring from the soil that is now cursed because of you.” So it’s not going to bring forth automatically like it would in the Garden of Eden.
Are you with me. So and then I told you about the story of Cain and Abel and where Cain killed Abel and his blood went into the earth and then the Lord again spoke words and He said now the earth is cursed because you have spilled your brother’s blood and because the earth is cursed it will no longer yield its strength to you. I then spent quite a lot of time on talking about the old man that is the Adam man that has the sin nature in you and how we change that sin nature is to receive Jesus as Lord and Saviour into your life. And as you receive Jesus as Lord and Saviour into your life you become a new man, a second, in the image of the second Adam being Jesus. So you become a whole new man, a new creation in Christ Jesus. When you become a new man we still have the soil of the earth that is cursed, because the whole world’s environment still lives under the Adamic law that was set into place when he gave over his authority to the devil, which is why the devil is still the prince of darkness and he stole over the realm of this earth. He still has a right to operate here but when you receive Jesus as Lord and Saviour what happens is that the new creation in you, the Christ in you becomes a new creature where you can speak words out of your heart that has now the ability to be infected by your spirit man.
So your spirit man impacts your soul and when your spirit and soul are in agreement you incubate your future words, and as you speak your words it creates your future. So I’ve said to you, you can either have one of two things happening. You can either have other people’s words coming and affecting your life, or your words can make your life. So you can choose whether you want other people’s words to just channel your life or whether your words create your life. That’s the way it is. So let’s just, a brief review of where we find ourselves now.
And I’ve spend quite a lot of time talking to you about that if you speak the words of Jesus, as a recreated spirit, as you speak the words of Jesus your soul is the incubation point for those words. It’s a soil where the seed of God’s words go into. And as the seeds of God’s words go into the soil of your heart, they begin to grow. It doesn’t happen overnight it’s a growing process. It begins to grow – 30, 60 and a 100 fold. And so you will know at a time when those words have grown up. You will know when the time comes for you to harvest those words. When you harvest those words you change everything that happens in your life, because that’s when faith comes. Hallelujah.
That’s when faith comes. Faith does not happen when the evidence of what you have been speaking occurs. Then you don’t have to have faith anymore because the evidence of what you’ve been having faith for is already made plain and clear. It’s there, it’s arrived. So if I say I have faith for a car, and then my car arrives I don’t have to have faith anymore because the evidence of the car has already arrived. But faith already sees the car arrived before it arrives. That’s not something that anybody can tell you when that level of faith arrives. That level of faith is when you know by the Holy Spirit to harvest your words that comes into faith. Hallelujah.
So this is very important because everything that happens in Jacobs’s constellation is all about words, and everything that I’m explained to you and if you walk in, going to walk in Jacob’s constellation it’s going to be about words. So, if you can put the slide up there for me please, about the generations that I’ve been talking about and so you know I’ve showed you the slide for a few times already but I’m starting there with Noah.
And there was a worldwide flood, but remember that I told you that Enoch was a man who walked with God when God took him and he had a son called Methuselah who lived the longest ever. Then he had a son called Lamech and Lamech had a son called Noah and He said Noah is going to be our deliverer.
And so Noah had some sons: Shem, Ham and Japheth. And eventually Shem became the father of Abraham. And Ham became the father of the Canaanites and Japheth became the father of a few others, the Gentiles, essentially. So it’s important for me to just remind you that when Noah spoke, when he spoke over Ham he cursed his son Canaan.
So when he, because of his nakedness and because of his, he was drunk and he was naked and because his sons came into his tent, the one son had a whole lot of opinions and a lot of things to say and basically exposed his father’s nakedness. When his father woke up and realized what had happened he had something to say. And he spoke words and he said, “Ham because if you’ve dishonored and disrespected me your sons, your son Canaan will be cursed.” So remember what I said about a curse. It’s a statement of fact that releases the power for that to come to pass as you speak it. So in those days’ words, it was understood words are the creator of everything. That’s why people like Enoch and Methuselah didn’t know how to die. Because they didn’t know how to speak words of death. They could only speak words that was in fellowship with the Father. That’s why Noah was the saviour of the world, because he had fellowship with the Father. Hallelujah.
So Noah speaks over Ham and he says, “Ham your son Canaan is cursed.” Statement of fact is going to come to pass; the power will be released to make sure that this happens. “And your son Canaan will be the servant of servants.” That’s what he will be in his future – servants of servants. So in other words anybody that’s going to be born out of Canaan is going to be the servant of servants. So then he spoke over Shem and he said, “Shem you are blessed and you’re going to be the, everything that comes from your seed is going to be blessed and prosperous and all the nations of the earth are going to be blessed through your seed.” And then he spoke about Japheth and he said, “Japheth you will enlarge and you will grow strong but you will do it under the leadership of Shem.”
So these words were spoken by a natural father who was also a spiritual father in the sense that he was the only living father on the earth. Right? So he was the original only remaining living father on the earth that came from a previous generation of people. So as the father that God the Father was talking to, he pronounces the blessing and the cursing. This is quite important. Now I’m going to read you some scripture.
And I’m reading from the New Living Translation, Genesis chapter 14 and I’m going to read you a little bit of through to chapter 15 and verse 21. 17After Abram returned from his victory over Kedorlaomer and all his allies, the king of Sodom went out to meet him in the valley of Shaveh (that is, the King’s Valley). 18And Melchizedek, the King of Salem and a priest of God Most High, brought Abram some bread and wine. 19Melchizedek blessed Abram with this blessing: So remember Abram came from Shem, so I’ve fast forwarded a whole lot because I need to get to Jacob. 19Melchizedek blessed Abram with this blessing: “Blessed be Abram by God Most High, Creator of heaven and earth. 20And blessed be God Most High, who has defeated your enemies for you.” Then Abram gave Melchizedek a tenth of all the goods he had recovered (Genesis 14:17-20 NLT).
So Abram in this moment of blessing, the first thing Abram does is take his natural possessions and tithes. So I just want to stop here for a moment and I want to just say this is the first recorded incident in the Bible of tithe – a tenth of recovered goods. I want to tell you that I’ve heard a lot of people teach and preach at all kinds of angles about this particular subject. And whenever you go back to the root of asking those people what they believe, they will tell you they don’t believe as a New Testament Christian that you should tithe. And the reason they go after this scripture is because they quite rightly point out that this is a scripture and an incident that goes before the law.
So whilst tithing was introduced in the law, people say that tithing is not a law that a New Testament Christian should live by. Well, if you want the blessing of salvation, then you need to have the blessing of Abraham. And so that, that’s the reason why people have a lot to say about this scripture, but they are coming from a place where they don’t want to tithe, they want to try and force tithing to be under the law. So let me tell you for the most part what they say, so that if you ever hear this, you can be clear on this.
They say that Abraham gave Melchizedek a tenth of all the goods he had recovered, so they say he gave a ten percent of all his increase, not of his wealth, that’s what they say.
Now Abram came from a place where he already had a certain amount of wealth before God called him. And when God called him, he began to obey God with everything that was his. He took his whole family, everything, and he obeyed God with everything that was his, he gave up his land, he gave up his country, he gave up his kingsmen, he followed God into new countries and new places with everything, not just a tent. So if you can get over that point where you obey God with everything, then you might want to agree with that person or those people, they would say he only gave a tenth of what was his increase.
However, let’s just be clear, that this was the first incident where he met a priest who was a representative of the Most High God, that was also in human form that it wasn’t God Himself directly speaking to him. This was the first incident where Abraham met a human man in the form of a God representative and in the first instance he did that, he gave a tenth of all of his increase.
This is important because this is not the only time that Melchizedek gets mentioned. Because if you go into the New Testament and you see in the book of Hebrews, the writer of the book of Hebrews begins to talk about this very incident of where Abraham met Melchizedek. And there is an incident that happens where Melchizedek blesses Abraham, he blesses the God of Abraham, and in this blessing the first thing he does is he gives him his increase. A tenth of all of his increase.
I want to focus on the fact that words were spoken for blessing, so when he said blessed be Abraham by God Most High, that means you are going to be empowered to prosper in everything you do by God Most High. Those are the words that he speaks. Creator of heaven and earth, so not just any God, this is the Creator. Because understand Abraham came from a place where lots of gods were worshipped. So he’s saying the God who created heaven and earth, this God is going to bless you. And bless be the Most High God who has defeated your enemies for you.
In other words, Abraham had just been in a fight and he was actually doing the fighting with spears and swords, but this man Melchizedek says, God fought your enemies for you. In other words, your victory might have come by your sword, but they actually had no chance because God was strengthening you to fight your enemies.
This is good news for you and I, because if we choose to walk in this blessing, we can have it. That even though we work with our hands, God gives us victory over enemies in the natural world. We have a Supernatural that comes upon us.
I go to verse 21, 21The king of Sodom said to Abram, “Give back my people who were captured. But you may keep for yourself all the goods you have recovered.” 22Abram replied to the king of Sodom, “I solemnly swear to the Lord, God Most High, Creator of heaven and earth (Genesis 14:21-22 NLT).
Melchizedek is standing there; he’s just spoken these words over Abraham. The king of Sodom comes into this place, and he repeats everything directly back to Sodom. My blessing comes from God, and I’m making an oath in front of that God, the God of Creator of heaven and earth. He says, 23that I will not take so as much as a single thread or sandal thong from what belongs to you. Otherwise you might say, “I am the one who made Abraham rich.” 24I will accept only what my young warriors have already eaten, and I request that you give a fair share of the goods to my allies (the ones who fought with me), – Aner, Eschol and Mamre (Genesis 14:23-24 NLT).
So Abram is very clear in this interchange where Melchizedek is present and the kings that they were already fight off, that there are words that are being spoken, there are words of blessing and then there are words of, of almost you want to say, covenant that is being established between Abraham and this king of Sodom. And he says I am not going to allow you to say that you made me rich when God made me rich. Hello, hello.
I stand before you already having come to all with you as a very rich man with a very lot of strength and you want to give me the let me keep all this wealth and all the stuff? I won’t keep it. Wow, so he gave 10% to God and the rest he gave back. Abram was making a statement: I trust in the Most High God. I trust in the Most High God. This is an important exchange because Melchizedek is a representative, some scholars and theologians will say it is Jesus, others say it is the Archangel that represented Jesus that dwells now in Melchizedek, because in the book of Hebrews, the Bible says there is no record of his beginning or end. Hallelujah.
Okay are you with me, I’m going to read Genesis chapter 14, still, all again from the New Living Translation verse 1. 1Sometime later, the Lord spoke to Abram in a vision and said to him, “Do not be afraid, Abram, for I will protect you, and your reward will be great.” 2But Abram replied, “O Sovereign Lord, what good are all your blessings when I don’t even have a son? Since you’ve given me no children, Eliezer of Damascus, a servant in my household, will inherit all my wealth (Genesis 15:1-2 NLT). So this is an important exchange because remember that when God, when Noah blessed Shem, he said through Shem the nations of the earth are going to be blessed. Abraham’s making a declaration to God how can this blessing be so great to me what value does all this money mean to me if I can’t give it to a next generation that is of me. So I am about, if I’m going to die all that’s going to happen to all those blessing and wealth you give me, that it’s going to go to my servant.
What did Noah say was going to happen to Ham’s Son, Canaan. That he was going to be a servant of servants. So, Abraham’s saying, “All this blessing of God is going to go to the servant, because I don’t have a son.” That’s why it’s important for us to have a son mentality, not a servant mentality. And this is a big thing that the devil tries to keep us always as a servant and in a servant mentality, rather than a son mentality. Anyway that’s a whole different conversation.
4Then the Lord said to him, “No, your servant will not be your heir, for you will have a son of your own who will be your heir.’’ 5Then the Lord took Abram outside and said to him, ‘‘Look up into the sky and count the stars if you can. That’s how many descendants you will have!’’ 6And Abram believed the Lord, and the Lord counted him as righteous because of his faith (Genesis 15:4-6 NLT). So, faith is something that you have in the words that God speaks to you, because when He speaks His Words to you, it is His will. So, if you receive His will and you give, and you believe His Words then God says I count you as righteous. That New Testament process is, “I believe Jesus is the Son of God,” and as you believe in your heart, the Words of the Good News, He gives you the faith to receive Him and you become a new creature. When you become a new creature you should be automatically wanting to believe all the Words that God speaks.
Let me say this to you again. As a new creature you heart wants to believe everything that God says. You have to make a choice not to believe God. This is not a situation where you are tempted by a that, or you, a, let me rather rephrase that. This is not a situation where I’m not mature enough as a Christian, therefore I make bad choices. No, you are, your heart is crying out to God to obey His Word, but in your immaturity you still choose to disobey. It’s not a choice of I must believe God, it’s a choice that you choose to disobey. It’s a whole different switch to thinking about faith. So the Lord counted it to him as faith. 7Then the Lord told Him, “I am the Lord who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldeans to give you this land as your possession.” 8But Abram replied, “O Sovereign Lord, how can I be sure that I will actually possess it?” (Genesis 15:7-8 NLT).
I think that is a good question. I mean this land that he has arrived at has a lot of people in it, and there is a lot of people occupying the land that his already in. And you will see later he had to negotiate with somebody for a burial ground that was living in the land of Canaan. Okay. Then, 9The Lord told him, Bring me a three-year-old heifer, a three-year-old female goat, a three-year-old ram, a turtle dove and a young pigeon. 10So Abram presented all these to him and killed them. Then he cut each animal down the middle and laid the halves side by side; he did not, however, cut the birds in half. 11Some vultures swooped down to eat the carcasses, but Abram chased them away. 12As the sun was going down, Abram fell into a deep sleep, and a terrifying darkness came down over him (Genesis 15:9 NLT).
Personally I believe the terrifying darkness is the darkness that he saw, is a vision in the next few words. 13Then the Lord said to Abram, “You can be sure that your descendants will be strangers in a foreign land, where they will be oppressed as slaves for 400 years (Genesis 15:13 NLT).
I believe Abram actually saw the oppression, which is why it’s called a terrifying darkness. 14But I will punish the nation that enslaves them, and in the end they will come away with great wealth. 15(As for you, you will die in peace and be buried at a ripe old age.) 16After four generations your descendants will return here to this land, for the sins of the Amorites do not yet warrant their destruction.” (Genesis 15:14-16 NLT).
So, these are words coming out of God’s mouth. So, he is not ready to curse the Amorites. He; God the Father, knows what their choices are leading them to. That there will come a season where their sins will be multiplied on each other and when their sins are fully come into, into fullness then God will judge their sin, that will be the time when the Israelites are released from Egypt and they will come into the land of the Amorites and destroy them. And you will then find out, actually that’s why God took so seriously what Saul didn’t do, because God gave Saul the task to destroy the nation of the Amorites, every living thing that was suppose, that was breathing in the Amorites, but he kept the king alive and he kept some of the animals alive. And so he lost his kingdom, because of that, essentially. Okay. Let me tell you there is nothing that happens in God’s Word that is by chance and by coincidence and we, we need to pay attention to this.
17After the sun went down and darkness fell, Abram saw a smoking firepot and a flaming torch pass between the halves of the carcasses. 18So the Lord made covenant with Abram that day and said, ‘‘I have given this land to your descendants, all the way from the border of Egypt to the great Euphrates River – 19the land now occupied by the Kenites the Kenizzites, the Kedmonites, 20Hittites, Perizzites, Raphaites, 21Ammorites, Canaanites, Girgashites, and Jebusites.” (Genesis 15:17-21 NLT).
I’m going to give you all this land. So God put Abraham to sleep and He made covenant by, He made covenant with Himself, because there was no one else He could make a covenant with. There was no one greater that He could do this with. I’m going to read this to you from Hebrews Chapter 6 verse 17, 17God also bound himself with an oath, so that those who received the promise could be perfectly sure that He would never change his mind. 18So God has given both His promise and His oath. These two things are unchangeable because it is impossible for God to lie. Therefore, we who have fled to Him for refuge can have a great confidence as we hold to the hope that lies before us. 19This hope is a strong and trustworthy anchor for our souls. It leads us through the curtain into God’s inner sanctuary. 20Jesus has already gone in there for us. He has become our eternal High priest in the order of Melchizedek.” (Hebrews 6:17-20 NLT).
So this thing that happens between Abram and Melchizedek is an important thing. It’s a blessing of words. It’s a tithe of increase. Chapter 7:1 of Hebrews, 1This Melchizedek was king of the city of Salem and also a priest of God Most High. When Abraham was returning home after winning a great battle against the kings, Melchizedek met him and blessed him. 2Then Abraham took a tenth of all he had captured in battle and gave it to Melchizedek. The Name Melchizedek means ‘‘king of justice,’’ and king of Salem means ‘‘king of peace.” 3There is no record of his father or mother or any of his ancestors – no beginning or end of his life. He remains a priest forever, resembling the Son of God (Hebrews 7:1-3 NLT). So there is the New Testament version of what happened. So we can quite honestly say, and say, make our stand that, “We thank you father that we serve God and Jesus is our Most High Priest that is forever in a place after the order of Melchizedek, who is the king of justice and the king of peace. Which means, we can always go to God and say because you represent us after the order of Melchizedek we demand that you stand for us in justice and in peace. So justice is not fairness, justice is God’s order of life. Peace is the blessing of God’s order of life. So if you are demanding God’s justice then you are saying, “I want the order of Your life to be in my world and I want the wholeness of Your order to be in my world”.
I know this is rich and wonderful stuff, I know that and you probably are not getting all of it in one time, which is why we have it on live streaming, which you can then watch YouTube during the week; or you can have it on the Heritage of Faith App that you can download on your phone and you can podcast it and listen to it again. I have done that to my own messages this week, because I needed to hear myself say some things I said by myself, under the Anointing. Because I recognized that they were things I said under the anointing that I need to hear for myself again. Take it or leave it.
Back to Genesis chapter 22, 1After these events God tested and proved Abraham and said to him, Abraham! And he said, Here I am. There’s always a good place to start with God; when He calls, you say, “Here I am.” You must respond to Him. 2God said take now your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the region of Moriah; and offer him there as burnt offering upon one of the mountains of which I will tell you (Genesis 22:1-8 AMPC). Wow! God has had all this communication with Abraham; He’s called him out of a country, He’s shown him His strength in war, He’s prophesied over him through a priest after the order of the eternal God, He’s free, He’s actually pronounced a blessing over him and said, “No you will have a son that will be the father of many nations.” And after all of this, he’s been living with the son of his old age if you want to call it that; the son that he never thought he could have. He now has the son and God shows up and says, “Now Abraham I want you to sacrifice your son to Me.” Huh? Wonder how many of us would do that? What is the thing that made Abraham do that? Is because he’s already had encounters with God, where God imputed His, imputed unto him, because he believed God, He gave him faith. His faith in God was given to him as righteousness. Yes, so when God said, “Give me your son.” He’s saying, “I have faith in You, like I’ve always had faith in You, because this is my most precious; everything is, makes no sense, there’s no sense about everything in my life, unless there’s a transfer into the future.
So what did Abraham do? 3Abraham rose early in the morning, saddled his donkey, took two of his young men with him and his son Isaac; and he split the wood of the burnt offering, and then began to the trip to the place which God told him. 4On the third day Abraham looked up and saw the place in the distance. 5And Abraham said to his servants, I mean this is important that Abraham obeyed God immediately, because he obeyed Him immediately, the Bible says on the third day he arrived there. Why is it the third day important? Because three days. So Abraham said to his servants, Settle down and stay here with the donkey, and I and the young man will go yonder and worship and come back again to you.
Now he’s faith is speaking, he said, “God said, give Me your son as a sacrifice and he tells his young men, “Stay here, the lad and I are going to go and worship and we will come back. I know God’s asked him, but my future makes no sense without God’s promise. So even if I kill him, God’s going to raise him from the dead and we will come back.” This is good, this is good, this is the way we got to talk that even though God seems to be asking a lot from you, you can say, “It doesn’t matter what happens with my seed, even if it’s everything I’ve got, He’s going to bless it and will raise it from the dead if He has to, but one thing is, it’s going to come back here.
6Then Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and laid it on [the shoulders of] Isaac his son, and he took up the fire (the firepot) in his own hand, and a knife; and the two of them went on together. 7Then Isaac said to Abraham, My father! And he said, Here I am, my son. [Isaac] said, see here are the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for the burnt sacrifice? 8Abraham said, My son, God Himself will provide a lamb for the burnt offering. So the two of them went on together (Genesis 22:1-8 AMPC).
It’s interesting to me that Isaac already has an understanding of the relationship between Abraham and God the Father that when he says, “God will provide.” He doesn’t question his father, because he knows his father has a walk with God. Sounds like the walk that Enoch had with God. He knows his father has a walk with God. I am impressed and I have, this is the moment for me to say it. I have been impressed by the Holy Spirit, as I’ve been preparing these messages to say, that I am believing, I am believing, my faith is out there, through prayer and intercession. I am declaring that this is going to restore the Spirit of the Eternal Father into the hearts of human earthly fathers, because many of us have made many mistakes with our natural kids. The only thing we can do as natural fathers is to trust the Heavenly Father to restore where we have made mistakes. We can trust the Heavenly Father that through Jesus our sons will walk with Jesus in a way that will restore their lives to Jesus. So I do not want this message to be used by the enemy to condemn fathers who have not done the job that they should be doing. Rather, I want to say this is a starting point where you as a father can choose to become the father that God in time said you must be. And say I choose to not allow the years that the locust has eaten as a father to prevent what God wants for my children in the future and to prevent me from becoming the father that God wants me to be a father in the future.
Come on now, I went at great lengths to show you before and I was so aware of my own inadequacies as a father raising my own sons. And not only did I get to a point where I could say Father everything that is my natural man that is being transferred to them, I can only ask You to overcome my weakness to them as I teach them to walk with You alongside me. So I have acknowledged, so remember I have said this the only starting point of faith is to realize that where you’re at. You have to have a realization of where your life is at.
If you have done some things, in your life, that you’ve trained your son, your daughter, your children, in a way, that is your way, because that’s your values and it’s your way you want them to live, life.
Come on now, this is the reason why you are a father, is because you want your children or a mother, you want your children to live the way you live, because the way you live, you think is the right way to live. However, you got to the place where you are living, the way you live. The way you live, is the way you think you should be living, and when you live the way, you think you should be living, you want your children to live the way, that you live.
Part of the way, you live the way you live, is because society has impacted the way you live. So, if I was growing up in a generation that was 70 years ago or a hundred years ago, even here in South Africa, a male man, a gentleman, would never even consider stepping outside of his house without a three-piece suit on. Probably with a hat on, he would have all kinds of mannerisms that society said; these categorize you, as a gentleman. So, if you were a gentleman, you’ve dressed like this, you wore a hat, you probably had some kind of a cane, as a symbol of your stature and your wealth and it would be the thing, that you would have a handkerchief in your pocket, because there might be some young lady or a woman that might be in distress, where they needed your hanky.
That was a cultural imposition, at that time and the man was expected to open the door for a woman, anywhere, anyplace, anytime, in fact such was the culture of the day, that a gentleman would take off his jacket, that was made from very expensive material, and if you were a gentleman, that’s what it was made of and it was tailored for you. There were no Woolworths, that you could go and buy clothes from, and the gentleman would take his jacket and throw it over a puddle of water, so that, the lady would not walk in the water, but walk over his jacket, so she doesn’t damage her shoes.
This is fact. That was, that was the imposition or the cultural demands of what a gentleman, would look like. So, in those days, if you were a father, raising your sons, your children, you would be expected, that as a father, you would teach your sons, how to be a gentleman and you would be judged by society, on how well you taught your children, to be, your sons in particular, to be a gentleman, because their future in society, depended on how well they could be gentlemen.
Which was partly, how you sat at the table, how you knew which forks and knives to eat with? Come on. So, even in our modern-day world, we have had society impose on us, things that society has demanded.
In a short space of time, I would say, in the last thirty years, it is changed dramatically. No longer are you considered a gentleman, in fact at this point in time in our society, a gentleman is what? Who knows, what a gentleman is, because woman’s liberation, has brought the role of a male to say, we women are equal to men. We don’t want you to open the door for us. We don’t even want you to have management positions that we can’t have. We don’t want; we want to be equal to you. So, a gentleman is what? A man is what, in our modern day society? So, yes, I get it, men abused their rights, as male dominant figures in a society. I get it, but there is still a place for a man, to take responsibility as a man, and be a man, and fathers have got to be fathers.
So, we are in a new generation, where the society is busy redefining itself completely, because young men do not take advice from their fathers. Young men, have no fathers, for many, many young men growing up they don’t have fathers. So, what they do is, they’re looking for male role models and so they look for them, everywhere, most likely some kind of star, some kind of, you know important figure.
Bring them to church, is what they should be and in the church they should find, very good wholesome fathers. What does that kind of a father look like? That kind of a father is not a man who’s taught his sons or his daughters, how well they should perform in society. That father, should be a man who shows them, how they should serve Jesus, how they should give their whole life assignment over to the Living God. How their whole life should be committed to the Living God, because then you become a cross cultural and generational blessing, because it doesn’t matter, which son comes into, which order of human society. The Order of Jesus Christ, the Order of Melchizedek, the Order of God the Father, goes through the generations because it becomes about a life in God, not about an outward mannerism.
Good preaching, right? That’s why I’ve got to preach this because, when we get to talk about Jacob’s constellation, Jacob was blessed by his father. Then he was talked about, his future by the Heavenly Father and then the Father had to make an identity change because of all the cultural things that had happened before, which I will show you. You will be blessed, to see it all, in one grand, beautiful picture, when I get to the end of it.
So, 8Abraham said, My son, God Himself will provide a lamb for the burnt offering. So the two went on together. 9 When they came to the place of which God had told him, Abraham built an altar there; then he laid the wood in order and bound Isaac his son and laid him on the altar on the wood. (Genesis 22:8-9 AMPC). You know, many people think Isaac was 13. You know, the people that say that he was, he’d just become a man, but there’s no, there’s no significant evidence that he was 13. It’s more likely that he was closer to the age of 30. So, there was more evidence about that, because he went with young men, which was Isaac’s age. So, he wasn’t going with a 13-year-old that he could dominate physically.
Isaac was going along, so, he was still under his father’s authority, but he was not yet a man that he could leave home. Not that he wanted to leave home, but tradition says, that at 30 years old, you could represent your father and all of your father’s household. So, he was not able to do that yet. So, he was not 30 yet. So, he was around that age.
So, when Isaac went to go lie on the altar, that wasn’t because, Abraham had this domination over him, he went and lay on the altar because he trusted his walk with God and he trusted his father’s walk with God. He trusted his father’s walk with God and he already had a trust in God.
So, he said, I’m supposed to be the sacrifice and, 10And Abraham stretched forth his hand and took hold of the knife to slay his son. 11But the Angel of the Lord called to him from heaven and said, Abraham, Abraham! He answered, Here I am. 12And He said, Do not lay your hand on the lad or do anything to him; for now I know that you fear and revere God, since you have not held back from Me or begrudged giving Me your son, your only son. 13Then Abraham looked up and glanced around, and behold, behind him was a ram caught in a thicket by his horns. And Abraham went and took the ram and offered it up for a burnt offering and an ascending sacrifice instead of his son! 14So Abraham called the name of that place The Lord Will Provide. And it is said to this day, On the mount of the Lord it will be provided. 15The Angel of the Lord called to Abraham from heaven a second time 16And said, I have sworn by Myself, says the Lord, that since you have done this and have not withheld [from Me] or begrudged [giving Me] your son, your only son, 17In blessing I will bless you and in multiplying I will multiply your descendants like the stars of the heavens and like the sand on the seashore. And your Seed (Heir) will possess the gate of His enemies, 18And in your Seed [Christ] shall all the nations of the earth be blessed and [by Him] bless themselves, because you have heard and obeyed My voice (Genesis 22:10-19 AMPC).
Well, I’ll tell you what, there is a great deal for us to meditate on here and I’m not going to stop here, I’m going to move on because I’ve got to go places. But this is a blessing that when He said to Abraham, when He said to Abraham, “In blessing, I will bless you,” so can I put it this way, in empowering you, I will power you and in multiplying I will multiply you. So I’m going to empower you and I’m going to multiply you and I’m going to give you the power and I’m going to give you the seed and your descendants like the stars of the heaven and the sand of the seashore and the seed will possess the gates of his enemies. Whatever enemies we have we can overcome them with this promise.
We don’t even have to go to anything in the New Testament. If you’ve got Jesus in your heart, you can overcome your enemies with this promise. Every enemy you can overcome with this promise. And in your Seed which is Christ, shall all the nations of the earth be blessed and by Him, by Jesus, bless themselves because you have obeyed My voice. That means you can bless yourself. How do you bless yourself? You take the Words of God, you put them in your heart and they grow up. And so, as you speak out your future, you bless your future. If you want to speak your emotions then you are going to speak things that your emotions will bring, you’re not blessing yourselves. If you speak what circumstances say, you’re going to get what circumstances want you to have. Or you can just bless yourself. Okay, you’re with me? We’ve got time it’s only ten-thirty, so can you give me ten more minutes? Hey? Are you still “wakker” (awake)? “Moet ek julle wakker skrik, of iets?” “Is julle saam met my?” (Are you with me?) Praise the Lord.
So Genesis 24, 1Now Abraham was old, well advanced in years, and the Lord had blessed Abraham in all things. So His promise came true already. The Lord blessed Abraham in all things. 2AndAbraham said to his eldest servant of his house [Eliezer of Damascus], who ruled over all that he had, I beg of you, put your hand under my thigh. (Genesis 24:1-2 AMPC). So this is not a sexual thing, this is a covenant thing. Put your hand on my thigh, in other words you are this close to me and you represent all of my strength and all of my wealth and all of my most precious to me. This represents you and I have a covenant on this matter. Okay? 3And you shall swear by the Lord, the God of heaven and earth, that you will not take a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites (Genesis 24:3 AMPC). So where’s Abraham living, in the land of Canaan. And all of these people are becoming his servants. He needs a wife for his son, so he says, “Swear to me that you will not find a wife for my son from the land of Canaan. You got to go somewhere else that you go to go fetch a wife for my son, because I can’t have a wife that is a servant of servants that’s going to work with the inheritance of the future”. 4Butyou shall go to my country and to my relatives and take a wife from for my son Isaac. 5The servant said to him, But perhaps the woman will not be willing to come along after me to this country. Must I take your son to the country from which you came?6Abraham said to him, See to it that you do not take my son back there (Genesis 24:4-6 AMPC).
So he’s not going back into his past to find a source for the future. Let me tell you, this is every reason why we shouldn’t go to our experience to find our future. We should go to God for our future, not our experience. If your experience happens to help you that’s fine. That experience does not equal wisdom and it does not equal your future. 7The Lord, the God of heaven, Who took me from my father’s house, from the land of my family and my birth, Who spoke to me and swore to me, saying, To your offspring I will give this land – He will send His Angel before you, and you will take a wife from there for my son (Genesis 24:7 AMPC).
Now Abraham is speaking with authority of a natural father but he knows the power of his words spoken under the anointing of the future. So he says, “Angel of the Lord will go before you and will lead you. So I know that it doesn’t make sense in the natural. You’re not taking my son, she’s not from here. Nobody’s going to know who your son is. How am I going to find a woman that even knows what kind of man, how is this going to happen? The Angel of the Lord will go with you and he’ll give you the right woman.” 8And if the woman should not be willing to go along after you, then you will be clear from this oath; only you must not take my son back there, Genesis 24:8 (AMPC). So this is the second time he’s being specific; Isaac must never go back. Isaac must always go forward. Okay, Genesis 24 verse 24, so he goes on the journey and he arrives at a place where, this place where he can feed his camels, from where Abraham came from. And he meets Rebecca. And so Rebecca feeds his camels, gives his camels water. And he gives her a whole lot of jewelry because he recognizes something has happened between Rebecca and him and that the Angel of the Lord is leading him. And he gives Rebecca jewelry for her to understand my master is wealthy. Every woman’s dream – let a man show up that’ll just lavish me with jewelry.
And she said to him, so he asked her who she is 24And she said to him, I am the daughter of Bethuel son of Milcah and [her husband] Nahor. Genesis 24:24(AMPC). You will see it is in the lineage, it comes from Noah. 25She said also to him, we have both straw and provender (fodder) enough, and also room in which to lodge. 26 The man bowed down his head and worshiped the Lord. (Genesis 24:25 AMPC). This is the servant. He bowed down his head and worshiped the Lord because he knows already that he found the place, he found the women. What I am about to say to you is where I am going to pick up next time when we talk because there is something that is about to happen that is very important in Jacob’s constellation. 28The girl related to her mother’s household what had happened. 29 Now Rebekah had a brother (Genesis 24:28 AMPC).
Everybody say to me, “Rebekah had a brother”. Okay, she goes back and speaks to her father and her whole family. So in the family is a brother, so this brother whose name was Laban. Laban hears the story and he ran out to the man at the well. So I ask you, who needs to give the approval to send Rebekah to another man, the father. What does Laban do, he is going to fetch the man, watch what Laban does. 30For when he saw the earring or the nose ring and the bracelets on his sister’s arms and when he heard Rebecca his sister saying this man said to me he went to the man and found him standing by the camels at the well. So what did he see that was given to Rebecca? Wealth. So, what does he do, he jumps on the bandwagon and 31He cried, come in, you blessed of the Lord! Oh man, he’s using all the right words, come in you blessed of the Lord. Which home was he supposed to go into? The Father. What did Rebecca say when she left him? We have food for your camels and lodging for you. Who she was she talking about? Her father, not her brother.
I’ll tell you one of the most future destroying things that could happen in anybody’s life is when they take the place of the father in the church and they see the opportunities that are all around them and they say we see it come to us, we’re part of this family let’s share in the wealth. 32So the man came into the house; and Laban ungirded his camels and gave straw and provender for the camels and water to bathe his feet and the feet of the men who were with him. 33A meal was set before him but he said, I will not eat until I have told of my errand and Laban said to him speak on. 34 And he said I am Abraham’s servant. 35And the Lord has blessed my master mightily and has become great; and he has given him flocks, herds, silver, gold, menservants, maidservants camels and asses Genesis 24:35(AMPC). So we go fast forward to verse 50 50Then Laban and Bethuel and now the father is in on the equation but who’s present? Laban. The thing comes from the Lord we cannot speak bad or good to you 51Rebekah is before you take her and go and let her be the wife of your master son as the Lord has said (Genesis 24:50-51AMPC).
It’s important for me to relay this part of the story, because I’m on the edge of getting to Jacob’s constellation because Laban has a big part to play in Jacob’s constellation because what Laban heard, he acted on, without authority. So what happened was that put him in a place where he assumed a responsibility, rather than given the authority, when he assumed responsibility and he assumed because of the proximity of what God was doing he assumed and he said let all of this be my portion too.
You will see that I preach and I teach on a subject that is in the Business School, this is not the first time I will teach it on Laban’s syndrome and the Laban syndrome is at work in all of our lives, the Laban syndrome. So I’m fast-forwarding a little bit, but I’ll just give you a taster. The Laban syndrome – it’s a syndrome that identifies opportunities and jumps in the middle of the opportunity and assumes the right to the opportunity regardless of whether it’s send there by God or not. The Laban syndrome will also keep you in debt and keep you under their influence for as long as they possibly can, because while they’re under their influence they can share in the blessing with you and you can never reach your full potential while you’re under someone who’s operated in the Laban syndrome.
Hey, die Pastoor preek baie goed vandag jong. (This pastor is preaching very good today). And that Laban syndrome is in the world today and so I hasten because I’ve got three more verses to read, I hastened to finish because I’m getting there, praise God. I asked the Lord today to please keep me focused so I could get to the place where I needed to be today, and so I just want to show you this that, because I’m going to talk about Jacob’s constellation and Jacob had three blessings; he had the blessing of the Father, he had the blessing of the future and he had the blessing of identity change.
I want to show you that under the guidance of Abraham Isaac was present when God did many of the things to establish the future. He himself was the sacrifice that God stopped and said I will bless all the nations through you and you can bless yourself and you have, all of this will come through your seed. Where was Isaac when God spoke out of the heavens, he was lying on the altar still, so the blessing was already upon Isaac. So there are three blessings that Isaac gets the first blessing is the blessing of the Heavenly Father that speaks over his future while he’s on the altar, the second blessing that he gets is that his father takes responsibility to take care of his future by going back into his generations and fetching a wife who would have the same blessing as Shem. So the second blessing was that he took his servant and sent his servant to get the right wife for him so that their partnership could be there for the future. So Isaac has three blessings the first blessing is from the father while he’s on the altar, the second blessing is that his father intercedes for him to get the woman he needs for the future, the third blessing is when Abraham dies, what was that: 5And Abraham gave all that he had to Isaac (Genesis 25:5 AMPC). Substantial power and strength and Might and wealth was all given to his son. So here is the order that when God steps up to the plate, He’s always going to reveal the future in what He’s doing and let me tell you when He said I’m going to bless you through Jesus He was already showing that He’s doing it in three. Three times God blessed Abraham and his future, his seed in his future. Three blessings came from Isaac and Jacob got three blessings, how many blessings do we have? Three: Father, Son, Holy Spirit and the other two have always talked about the future who is the Holy Spirit. 11After the death of Abraham, God blessed his son Isaac, and Isaac dwelt at Beer-lahai-roi, which means [A well to the living one who sees me] (Genesis 25:11 AMPC). So Isaac has a well and he says this is a well to the living One who sees me, He no longer sees my father He sees me. Every son has got to get to the point where he says, “Father God sees me.” It is my job to make you get to the point where you can say, “My Father sees me”, because when you know that your Father sees you, then all the blessings come to you. If you don’t see, you don’t get.
And so I just want to finish this off because it takes us nicely into next week. Genesis 25 verse 19, 19And this is the history of the descendants of Isaac Abraham’s son: Abraham was the father of Isaac. 20Isaac was 40 years old when he married Rebecca the daughter of Bethuel the Aramean and the sister of Laban the Aramean (Genesis 25:20 AMPC).
So the scriptures are determined to put Laban’s name in here because of who Laban was. 21And Isaac prayed much to the Lord for his wife because she was unable to bear children. Oh Lord how is it possible that Abraham, who’s this blessed man, who says and I was lying on the altar and I’m supposed to be the seed of generations and you go supernaturally and go get me a wife through the blessing of my father and now she can’t bear. What’s the whole deal about that? Well Isaac said, “I’m going to make sure that I am in a condition where my relationship, the One who sees me, is also hearing me”. Come on now. The One who sees me, is the One who hears me. 21and the Lord granted his prayer and Rebekah his wife became pregnant (Genesis 25:21 AMPC). And so then when because the Lord heard him, He immediately blessed her with double. And that’s normally also the order of God. He normally, if something’s been taken from you, He at least blesses you with double. And so she became pregnant, 22[Two] children struggled together within her; and she said, If it is so [that the Lord has heard our prayer], why am I like this? And she went to inquire of the Lord. 23The Lord said to her, [The founders of] two nations are in your womb, and the separation of two peoples has begun in your body; the one people shall be stronger than the other, and the elder shall serve the younger (Genesis 25:22, 23 AMPC).
And so now God is, remember last week I spoke about intervention, God is intervening, and He Himself is intervening to the mother-to-be. And because she asked, He gave her the answer. You have two nations in your womb, and they are going to be separate peoples, and whatever is going to happen between the two of them that’s already happening in your womb. And the younger is going to be the master of the older, or otherwise put, the older will serve the younger. Which is just not the way things work. But God is already speaking to the future, because Jacob’s constellation is the order of things that we can follow, that God has established through Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He has established an order. It is the order of the blessing of the father. It is the order of the blessing of the future, and it is the order of the blessing of identity change. For us to walk in the fullness of all of these things, we must experience all three, and that is Jacob’s constellation.
And next week, we will talk about Jacob’s constellation, finally. Hallelujah. Because I had to get you here, because if I just tell you that these men spoke words of blessing, then it just, we take it for granted in our Christian circle. Oh well, He bless them, and He cursed them, and He blessed them. Hey! We have to understand that when you speak words out of your mouth, they have eternal consequences. If you say nothing, the eternal consequence of saying nothing, is nothing eternally. If you say words that are against the Father’s will, the eternal consequences are that you reap what is against the Father’s will. If you speak in line with the Father’s will, you reap eternally what is in line with the Father’s will. What I’m teaching you, takes faith to believe this. This is not what you can understand with your intellect. Although this is giving you information, it’s not the information that’s going to change you. It’s the revelation of this that changes you. It’s never the information that does anything to you, it’s the revelation, and the power of the revelation that changes you. Hallelujah.
I told you and I finish with this. I told you that that the revelation that changed my world, is when I was reading my Bible one Sunday afternoon, I read in the book of John, 1 John chapter 3. I began to read about the love of God and that in the love of God there is no fear, and perfect love casts out fear. And I began to realize that God loves me so much, that I have nothing to fear from Him, and that He has my life completely in His hands, if I completely give my life to Him. And when I realized that He loves me completely, that there is nothing that I can do that can separate me from His love, and there is nothing that I can do to improve His love towards me, and that His love is perfect, and His love is forever, and His love is towards me and that I can completely be safe in the love of God, and He loves me so completely, that there is nothing that can change anything about Him towards me, and there’s nothing that I can do that can change anything about Him towards me. I received His love so completely that I said, “Why should I not have complete faith in this God.”
So it changed my whole faith walk. Where I would stand in front of cupboards and command cupboards to be full of food. And the same thing that happened when I went into business I commanded business to come into my hands. And when it looked impossible circumstances where there wasn’t business, I could speak, God’s words in my mouth, and say, I command that business deal like it looks like it’s gone to someone else, I command it to come into my hands, and everything looked impossible that it could come into my hands, but my confession stayed strong, because faith was in my heart, because the love of God was there. Hallelujah. Praise the name of Jesus, Praise the name of Jesus.
And I speak these words over you today that you do not just receive information but you receive revelation. That these words have the power to change your future, because they will grow up in your heart, and they will become a harvest of faith, and that you will live your faith, your life by faith. You will live your life in faith. You will live your life in the Son of God. And you will agree with the Word of God that says, “We live and move, and have our being in Him, in Jesus name. I make a declaration over you today, that this is the time of changing-point revelation, Hallelujah. Glory to Jesus.
Won’t you stand to your feet please? I need to ask you, if you’re a born-again believer, standing here today, if you’re born again, Jesus lives in your heart, I want you to put up your hand please? This is important, put up your hand if you are that. Okay look around you, keep your hand up, look around you. Is there anybody that doesn’t have their hand up? If you see anybody that doesn’t have their hand up, you bring them to me afterwards, and we’ll lead them to Jesus. Hallelujah. Glory to God.
I want to just pray over you. Can I pray over you, blessing over you? Father, every time when I pray these prayers, I know that my prayers have weight in the Heavenly realm before You. And it is the reason I make these declarations every week over Your people, because it is onetime that I am together in their presence, that I can speak by the authority of the Holy Spirit. And I say Father I ask You to bless them. I ask You to keep them. I’m not asking You as Jesus prayed to take them out of the world, but to keep them from the evil one. And I pray Father that the Holy Spirit will be their strengthener, their comforter and their helper. That these words will become real and powerful revelation in their lives. And I ask You Father that no weapon formed against them will prosper. I ask You Father that the Blood of Jesus surrounds them and protects them. And even in this week I pray, that as these words begin to grow in their spirit and in their hearts, it will begin to bear fruit, and they will prosper in all that they do, Hallelujah. You will cause them to have divine connections. You will cause them to walk in divine places, and blessings will overtake them Father. In the name of Jesus. If you agree with this prayer today, will you say Amen? Thank you for coming to Church today. Mag die Here julle seën. (May the Lord bless you). Amen.
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