WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:05.000 About 500 years ago, the Protestant Reformation began 00:00:05.000 --> 00:00:10.000 where Martin Luther and other reformers began to reclaim 00:00:10.000 --> 00:00:14.000 the true gospel from the grip of a church 00:00:14.000 --> 00:00:17.000 that seemed just entirely lifeless. 00:00:17.000 --> 00:00:21.000 And from that Reformation era, 00:00:21.000 --> 00:00:26.000 we inherited a beautiful Latin phrase, 00:00:26.000 --> 00:00:30.000 post-Tenebros lux. 00:00:30.000 --> 00:00:35.000 It means after darkness, light. 00:00:35.000 --> 00:00:38.000 When the world seemed at its bleakest, 00:00:38.000 --> 00:00:41.000 when the gospel seemed to be entirely lost, 00:00:41.000 --> 00:00:44.000 and when even the church had become so corrupt 00:00:44.000 --> 00:00:47.000 that it bore little or no resemblance to the early church 00:00:47.000 --> 00:00:49.000 of the New Testament times, 00:00:49.000 --> 00:00:55.000 after all of that darkness, light. 00:00:55.000 --> 00:01:00.000 Post-Tenebros lux is a picture of a sunrise, isn't it? 00:01:00.000 --> 00:01:03.000 You'll be familiar with the idea, the phrase, 00:01:03.000 --> 00:01:08.000 that the darkest part of the night happens just before dawn. 00:01:08.000 --> 00:01:13.000 And isn't it true that the darkness of the night 00:01:13.000 --> 00:01:20.000 makes the first rays of the sun even more beautiful? 00:01:20.000 --> 00:01:22.000 After darkness, light. 00:01:22.000 --> 00:01:27.000 That phrase absolutely fills me with hope. 00:01:27.000 --> 00:01:30.000 It fills me with hope because I see a lot of darkness. 00:01:30.000 --> 00:01:33.000 I see darkness in the world around us, 00:01:33.000 --> 00:01:39.000 and I see quite a lot of darkness in myself. 00:01:39.000 --> 00:01:41.000 You know, the first book of the Old Testament, 00:01:41.000 --> 00:01:44.000 and this is a series called The Story of the Old Testament, 00:01:44.000 --> 00:01:46.000 where we're kind of walking through the major moments 00:01:46.000 --> 00:01:49.000 of that big chunk of our Bibles 00:01:49.000 --> 00:01:52.000 that can be so difficult to understand. 00:01:52.000 --> 00:01:54.000 This first book is called Genesis, 00:01:54.000 --> 00:01:58.000 and you could really sum up the theme of Genesis 00:01:58.000 --> 00:02:01.000 with the phrase, after darkness, light. 00:02:01.000 --> 00:02:04.000 That's how we're introduced to the book of Genesis. 00:02:04.000 --> 00:02:06.000 It's how we're introduced to the world, 00:02:06.000 --> 00:02:08.000 and it's how we're introduced to God. 00:02:08.000 --> 00:02:12.000 Let's read Genesis 1, 1-4 quickly. 00:02:12.000 --> 00:02:15.000 In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. 00:02:15.000 --> 00:02:18.000 The earth was without form and void, 00:02:18.000 --> 00:02:20.000 and darkness was over the face of the deep, 00:02:20.000 --> 00:02:23.000 and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters, 00:02:23.000 --> 00:02:28.000 and God said, let there be light, and there was light. 00:02:28.000 --> 00:02:31.000 And God saw that the light was good. 00:02:31.000 --> 00:02:33.000 Now, if Genesis were a movie, 00:02:33.000 --> 00:02:38.000 the opening scene would be on this dark, 00:02:38.000 --> 00:02:42.000 churning, chaotic, watery mass. 00:02:42.000 --> 00:02:47.000 No land, no life, no light. 00:02:47.000 --> 00:02:50.000 That's the opening scene in our movie, 00:02:50.000 --> 00:02:53.000 and then God speaks. 00:02:53.000 --> 00:02:55.000 It's just two little words in Hebrew 00:02:55.000 --> 00:02:57.000 when we say, let there be light in English. 00:02:57.000 --> 00:03:00.000 In Hebrew, it's more like, exist light, 00:03:00.000 --> 00:03:05.000 and poof, light springs into existence. 00:03:07.000 --> 00:03:10.000 Then, of course, God creates humans, 00:03:10.000 --> 00:03:13.000 and he forms land and animals and plants and trees, 00:03:13.000 --> 00:03:16.000 and he puts humans on that good earth. 00:03:16.000 --> 00:03:18.000 And in Genesis chapter three, 00:03:18.000 --> 00:03:20.000 which Derek preached from last Sunday, 00:03:20.000 --> 00:03:23.000 that would be in our Genesis movie. 00:03:23.000 --> 00:03:26.000 It would be the tragic climax. 00:03:26.000 --> 00:03:28.000 It's actually the bleakest moment 00:03:28.000 --> 00:03:30.000 in all of the Old Testament, I think. 00:03:30.000 --> 00:03:34.000 God planted Adam and Eve in this amazing garden, 00:03:34.000 --> 00:03:39.000 and he provided for them just an abundance of food, 00:03:39.000 --> 00:03:41.000 and beauty, and peace. 00:03:41.000 --> 00:03:44.000 He gave them everything they could ever want, 00:03:44.000 --> 00:03:48.000 an absolute wealth of generosity from God. 00:03:48.000 --> 00:03:53.000 But Adam and Eve, they spit on God's generosity, 00:03:53.000 --> 00:03:56.000 and they ate from the one and only tree 00:03:56.000 --> 00:04:01.000 that they were told not to eat from. 00:04:01.000 --> 00:04:03.000 They had the world at their fingertips, 00:04:03.000 --> 00:04:07.000 and they chose the one thing they weren't supposed to do. 00:04:07.000 --> 00:04:09.000 That's why I called this the bleakest chapter 00:04:09.000 --> 00:04:11.000 of the Old Testament. 00:04:11.000 --> 00:04:15.000 God made us, God made humans for innocence, 00:04:15.000 --> 00:04:18.000 and righteousness, and joy. 00:04:18.000 --> 00:04:22.000 And we looked at that wonderful feast, 00:04:22.000 --> 00:04:31.000 and we chose guilt, wickedness, discontent. 00:04:31.000 --> 00:04:33.000 We chose darkness instead of light, 00:04:33.000 --> 00:04:36.000 and darkness crept over the world that day, 00:04:36.000 --> 00:04:38.000 and crept over the hearts of humanity that day, 00:04:38.000 --> 00:04:42.000 and it hasn't left. 00:04:42.000 --> 00:04:44.000 And in the darkest moment of the Old Testament, 00:04:44.000 --> 00:04:48.000 right after sin enters the world in Genesis 3, 00:04:48.000 --> 00:04:53.000 God announced a plan, a glimmer of light. 00:04:53.000 --> 00:04:58.000 The announcement comes in chapter 3, verse 15, 00:04:58.000 --> 00:05:02.000 where God says to the serpent who deceived Eve, 00:05:02.000 --> 00:05:06.000 I will put enmity between you and the woman, 00:05:06.000 --> 00:05:09.000 and between your offspring and her offspring. 00:05:09.000 --> 00:05:16.000 He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel. 00:05:16.000 --> 00:05:22.000 When Adam and Eve sinned, Satan's rule over this world began. 00:05:22.000 --> 00:05:26.000 But God's glorious announcement to the world, 00:05:26.000 --> 00:05:31.000 his plan, is to let us know that Satan's grip on us 00:05:31.000 --> 00:05:34.000 won't last forever. 00:05:34.000 --> 00:05:40.000 The darkness will one day give way to eternal day. 00:05:40.000 --> 00:05:44.000 Now, if you tug on this thread, this announcement of God's plan, 00:05:44.000 --> 00:05:48.000 if you tug on the thread through the Old Testament 00:05:48.000 --> 00:05:53.000 and into the new, it leads you to Jesus. 00:05:53.000 --> 00:05:58.000 In the book of Galatians many, many years later, 00:05:58.000 --> 00:06:03.000 the apostle Paul wrote, and he reminds us that in this verse 00:06:03.000 --> 00:06:09.000 that God doesn't say offsprings, plural, he says offspring, singular. 00:06:09.000 --> 00:06:13.000 Paul reminds us that the offspring of the woman, 00:06:13.000 --> 00:06:16.000 the promised offspring, is Jesus. 00:06:16.000 --> 00:06:23.000 Jesus, the serpent crusher. Jesus, the conqueror of death. 00:06:23.000 --> 00:06:28.000 Jesus, the light of the world. 00:06:28.000 --> 00:06:31.000 That's why John the Baptist's father in Luke's Gospel 00:06:31.000 --> 00:06:34.000 could sing that because of the tender mercies of God, 00:06:34.000 --> 00:06:37.000 the sunrise shall visit us from on high 00:06:37.000 --> 00:06:40.000 to give light to those who sit in darkness 00:06:40.000 --> 00:06:45.000 and in the shadow of death. 00:06:45.000 --> 00:06:49.000 Now, God didn't just snap his fingers and zap Jesus into existence. 00:06:49.000 --> 00:06:52.000 As we've been learning in our Evening Service series, 00:06:52.000 --> 00:06:58.000 Jesus was fully God and fully human, which means he had a family. 00:06:58.000 --> 00:07:04.000 And that means that if he had a family, then he had ancestors. 00:07:04.000 --> 00:07:09.000 That's why this story about God calling Abram out of Ur of the Chaldees 00:07:09.000 --> 00:07:11.000 is so important. 00:07:11.000 --> 00:07:15.000 In a world of darkness and rebellion, 00:07:15.000 --> 00:07:19.000 God called one man out of that darkness. 00:07:19.000 --> 00:07:22.000 Let's read Genesis 12, 1-3 again. 00:07:22.000 --> 00:07:23.000 Now, the Lord said to Abram, 00:07:23.000 --> 00:07:28.000 go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you. 00:07:28.000 --> 00:07:30.000 And I will make of you a great nation. 00:07:30.000 --> 00:07:33.000 And I will bless you and make your name great 00:07:33.000 --> 00:07:35.000 so that you will be a blessing. 00:07:35.000 --> 00:07:38.000 I will bless those who bless you and him who dishonors you. 00:07:38.000 --> 00:07:39.000 I will curse. 00:07:39.000 --> 00:07:45.000 And in you, all the families of the earth shall be blessed. 00:07:45.000 --> 00:07:47.000 So why did God call Abram? 00:07:47.000 --> 00:07:51.000 Well, he called Abram to make of him a great nation. 00:07:51.000 --> 00:07:58.000 And from that nation, the very thing that would make it great is that Jesus would come. 00:07:58.000 --> 00:08:00.000 The offspring of the woman. 00:08:00.000 --> 00:08:04.000 Jesus, the light of the world. 00:08:04.000 --> 00:08:06.000 Do you remember how the New Testament begins? 00:08:06.000 --> 00:08:09.000 Matthew chapter one, verse one, 00:08:09.000 --> 00:08:11.000 the book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, 00:08:11.000 --> 00:08:17.000 the son of David, the son of Abraham. 00:08:17.000 --> 00:08:24.000 And Matthew traces Jesus' ancestry from Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Judah, 00:08:24.000 --> 00:08:28.000 all the way through David, and all the way up to Joseph, the husband of Mary, 00:08:28.000 --> 00:08:32.000 the mother of Christ. 00:08:32.000 --> 00:08:37.000 The New Testament writers, the first thing they wanted us to know 00:08:37.000 --> 00:08:43.000 is that Jesus is the offspring that was promised way back in the beginning 00:08:43.000 --> 00:08:46.000 from the line of Abraham. 00:08:46.000 --> 00:08:51.000 Now, that's why this passage has been called the thematic center of the whole Pentateuch, 00:08:51.000 --> 00:08:54.000 which is the first five books of the Old Testament. 00:08:54.000 --> 00:08:57.000 And that's why this passage is so important. 00:08:57.000 --> 00:09:00.000 It's not just the story of a man on a journey. 00:09:00.000 --> 00:09:04.000 It's the story of hope. 00:09:04.000 --> 00:09:08.000 Now, from this passage, then I want to draw three implications for us today. 00:09:08.000 --> 00:09:10.000 Number one, you're not an outsider. 00:09:10.000 --> 00:09:11.000 I'm sorry. 00:09:11.000 --> 00:09:14.000 Number one, you are an outsider in the world. 00:09:14.000 --> 00:09:16.000 You're an outsider here. 00:09:16.000 --> 00:09:20.000 Number two, you're not an outsider in the family of God. 00:09:20.000 --> 00:09:27.000 And number three, hope is bright when the world is dark. 00:09:27.000 --> 00:09:28.000 All right. 00:09:28.000 --> 00:09:32.000 Number one, you're an outsider in the world. 00:09:32.000 --> 00:09:36.000 Genesis 12.1, go from your country and your kindred and your father's house 00:09:36.000 --> 00:09:39.000 to the land that I will show you. 00:09:39.000 --> 00:09:43.000 Now, the life of Abram, who would later be renamed Abraham, 00:09:43.000 --> 00:09:49.000 is the life of a pilgrim who was a camper. 00:09:49.000 --> 00:09:55.000 He was and would always be a sojourner and a stranger in a faraway land. 00:09:55.000 --> 00:09:58.000 Now, God called Abraham out. 00:09:58.000 --> 00:10:01.000 One of the key words here really is the word from. 00:10:01.000 --> 00:10:05.000 Go from your country and kindred and father's house. 00:10:05.000 --> 00:10:10.000 This is important because the call to become a part of God's family 00:10:10.000 --> 00:10:16.000 is a call to go out from something. 00:10:16.000 --> 00:10:20.000 If you're a Christian, then you're part of God's family. 00:10:20.000 --> 00:10:23.000 And God has called you to leave. 00:10:23.000 --> 00:10:33.000 He's called you to go out from the ways of sin and death that we used to follow. 00:10:33.000 --> 00:10:36.000 In Romans 13.12, the Holy Spirit says through Paul, 00:10:36.000 --> 00:10:40.000 the night is far gone, the day is at hand. 00:10:40.000 --> 00:10:45.000 So then let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light. 00:10:45.000 --> 00:10:51.000 Go out from your sinful ways to the ways of righteousness, of light. 00:10:51.000 --> 00:10:56.000 He says in Ephesians 5.8, at one time you were darkness, 00:10:56.000 --> 00:11:00.000 but now you are light in the Lord. 00:11:00.000 --> 00:11:03.000 Walk as children of the light. 00:11:03.000 --> 00:11:10.000 We're called from darkness into light, 00:11:10.000 --> 00:11:15.000 if we've had the call to join God's family. 00:11:15.000 --> 00:11:20.000 Now, for some of you, the call to become a part of God's family 00:11:20.000 --> 00:11:25.000 literally takes you from your earthly family. 00:11:25.000 --> 00:11:29.000 Some of you don't have Christian parents or Christian friends. 00:11:29.000 --> 00:11:34.000 And when you become a Christian, maybe it felt like a curtain fell between you, 00:11:34.000 --> 00:11:36.000 relationally. 00:11:36.000 --> 00:11:42.000 Maybe it felt like you lost something, like you had to leave something behind. 00:11:42.000 --> 00:11:46.000 If you resonate with that, I want you to hear this, 00:11:46.000 --> 00:11:50.000 the words of Jesus from the Gospel of Mark chapter 10. 00:11:50.000 --> 00:11:55.000 Jesus said, truly I say to you, there is no one, no one, 00:11:55.000 --> 00:12:01.000 who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands 00:12:01.000 --> 00:12:04.000 for my sake and for the Gospel, 00:12:04.000 --> 00:12:09.000 who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, 00:12:09.000 --> 00:12:12.000 houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, 00:12:12.000 --> 00:12:19.000 with persecutions and in the age to come, eternal life. 00:12:19.000 --> 00:12:26.000 In other words, life with Jesus starting now and going on for all of eternity 00:12:26.000 --> 00:12:33.000 is better, worth more than everything we've left behind to follow Him. 00:12:33.000 --> 00:12:37.000 He's worth it. 00:12:37.000 --> 00:12:43.000 And He does not take your sacrifice lightly. 00:12:43.000 --> 00:12:51.000 Now in His first letter, the apostle Peter calls us sojourners and exiles. 00:12:51.000 --> 00:12:53.000 That's really important. 00:12:53.000 --> 00:12:56.000 Abraham, as we've discussed in our kids talk earlier, 00:12:56.000 --> 00:12:59.000 Abraham lived in tents, not mansions, right? 00:12:59.000 --> 00:13:04.000 So if you're a follower of Jesus, you are a sojourner 00:13:04.000 --> 00:13:08.000 and this world is not your home anymore. 00:13:08.000 --> 00:13:12.000 So if this world is not your home, 00:13:12.000 --> 00:13:16.000 don't be surprised when the world hates you. 00:13:16.000 --> 00:13:20.000 Don't be surprised when you find yourself politically homeless 00:13:20.000 --> 00:13:24.000 or when you find yourself standing up for justice and morality 00:13:24.000 --> 00:13:30.000 in an age of oppression and anything goes. 00:13:30.000 --> 00:13:35.000 You're an outsider to the world. 00:13:35.000 --> 00:13:41.000 But point number two, you are not an outsider in the family of God. 00:13:41.000 --> 00:13:44.000 Abraham was called from Ur of the Caldees. 00:13:44.000 --> 00:13:50.000 Now Ur was a pagan nation far from God, full of sorcery. 00:13:50.000 --> 00:13:52.000 They were well known for their sorcery. 00:13:52.000 --> 00:13:56.000 And it was a moon worshipping cult. 00:13:56.000 --> 00:14:02.000 Before God called Abram out of Ur, he wasn't ever since a stranger to God. 00:14:02.000 --> 00:14:05.000 He knew nothing about God and His ways. 00:14:05.000 --> 00:14:11.000 And weren't we all in the same boat at one time? 00:14:11.000 --> 00:14:16.000 Before Jesus saved me, I was as far from Him as you could imagine. 00:14:16.000 --> 00:14:18.000 And I wouldn't have sought Him out. 00:14:18.000 --> 00:14:20.000 I wouldn't have chosen Him on my own. 00:14:20.000 --> 00:14:24.000 I was hopeless. I was helpless. 00:14:24.000 --> 00:14:27.000 Weren't you? 00:14:27.000 --> 00:14:32.000 But if you follow Jesus now, then you are not an outsider. 00:14:32.000 --> 00:14:35.000 You're not a stranger in God's family anymore. 00:14:35.000 --> 00:14:38.000 In Ephesians 2, the Spirit says through Paul, 00:14:38.000 --> 00:14:44.000 You are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints 00:14:44.000 --> 00:14:47.000 and members of the household of God. 00:14:47.000 --> 00:14:50.000 Built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, 00:14:50.000 --> 00:14:53.000 Christ Jesus Himself being the cornerstone, 00:14:53.000 --> 00:14:56.000 in whom the whole structure being joined together, 00:14:56.000 --> 00:15:00.000 grows into a holy temple in the Lord. 00:15:00.000 --> 00:15:06.000 In Him you are also being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit. 00:15:06.000 --> 00:15:09.000 A dwelling place for God. 00:15:09.000 --> 00:15:16.000 What could be more dignifying than that? 00:15:16.000 --> 00:15:21.000 What could be better in this cutthroat world 00:15:21.000 --> 00:15:29.000 than knowing that to God, you belong? 00:15:29.000 --> 00:15:33.000 It doesn't matter how dark your past is. 00:15:33.000 --> 00:15:36.000 It doesn't matter how impressive you are, 00:15:36.000 --> 00:15:40.000 or how much money you make, or what your family background is, 00:15:40.000 --> 00:15:44.000 or how much of a good person you are, or how intelligent you are. 00:15:44.000 --> 00:15:51.000 All that matters is that you look to Jesus as the only source and cure 00:15:51.000 --> 00:15:53.000 for the darkness of the world, 00:15:53.000 --> 00:15:59.000 and as the only source and cure for the darkness in your heart. 00:15:59.000 --> 00:16:04.000 And then you love, trust, and follow Him. 00:16:04.000 --> 00:16:10.000 If you follow Jesus, you belong in the family of God. 00:16:10.000 --> 00:16:14.000 Now Abraham didn't have to convince God, 00:16:14.000 --> 00:16:16.000 said, God, please send me. 00:16:16.000 --> 00:16:18.000 He didn't twist God's arm. 00:16:18.000 --> 00:16:19.000 That's important. 00:16:19.000 --> 00:16:21.000 One of my favorite little verses from the Bible 00:16:21.000 --> 00:16:24.000 is in John chapter 16. 00:16:24.000 --> 00:16:30.000 Jesus says, the Father Himself loves you. 00:16:30.000 --> 00:16:35.000 No one twisted God's arm to get you into His family. 00:16:35.000 --> 00:16:39.000 Jesus didn't have to plead with God to accept you. 00:16:39.000 --> 00:16:42.000 It's not like God hated you, but Jesus, God the Son, loved you. 00:16:42.000 --> 00:16:45.000 God, the Father Himself loves you. 00:16:45.000 --> 00:16:49.000 God wants you to be in His family. 00:16:49.000 --> 00:16:52.000 God likes you. 00:16:52.000 --> 00:16:54.000 God likes having you around, 00:16:54.000 --> 00:16:56.000 and He wants to spend eternity with you. 00:16:56.000 --> 00:17:00.000 Who do you like that much? 00:17:00.000 --> 00:17:03.000 God loves you enough to send His own Son, 00:17:03.000 --> 00:17:06.000 to take you from the kingdom of darkness, 00:17:06.000 --> 00:17:09.000 and at the cost of His Son, 00:17:09.000 --> 00:17:12.000 bring you into His glorious light 00:17:12.000 --> 00:17:16.000 and make you a child of the day. 00:17:16.000 --> 00:17:20.000 Your sins, then, your own inner darkness, 00:17:20.000 --> 00:17:23.000 does not keep you, 00:17:23.000 --> 00:17:26.000 and cannot keep you from belonging 00:17:26.000 --> 00:17:29.000 in the family of God. 00:17:29.000 --> 00:17:31.000 Your own inner darkness and sins 00:17:31.000 --> 00:17:34.000 merely qualifies you to receive the mercy 00:17:34.000 --> 00:17:36.000 and forgiveness of God, 00:17:36.000 --> 00:17:41.000 which is just the entryway into that kingdom of light anyway. 00:17:41.000 --> 00:17:44.000 In Colossians 1, we read, 00:17:44.000 --> 00:17:47.000 God has delivered us from the domain of darkness 00:17:47.000 --> 00:17:50.000 and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, 00:17:50.000 --> 00:17:52.000 in whom we have redemption, 00:17:52.000 --> 00:17:57.000 the forgiveness of sins. 00:17:57.000 --> 00:18:01.000 All right, well, 00:18:01.000 --> 00:18:04.000 you're an outsider to the world. 00:18:04.000 --> 00:18:08.000 You're not an outsider in the family of God. 00:18:08.000 --> 00:18:13.000 Number three, hope is bright when the world is dark. 00:18:13.000 --> 00:18:16.000 Now, I don't have to teach you about darkness, 00:18:16.000 --> 00:18:20.000 about the darkness of the world or the darkness in you. 00:18:20.000 --> 00:18:25.000 The world is full of physical and spiritual darkness, isn't it? 00:18:25.000 --> 00:18:30.000 And if we're being honest, our hearts are just the same. 00:18:30.000 --> 00:18:33.000 In his memoirs, Chronicles of a Wasted Life, 00:18:33.000 --> 00:18:35.000 I looked for the quote, to quote it precisely, 00:18:35.000 --> 00:18:37.000 and I couldn't find it. It's a big book. 00:18:37.000 --> 00:18:40.000 But Malcolm Muggeridge said something like, 00:18:40.000 --> 00:18:43.000 there's no sin, no evil, 00:18:43.000 --> 00:18:46.000 that I haven't either done myself 00:18:46.000 --> 00:18:50.000 or seriously thought about doing. 00:18:50.000 --> 00:18:53.000 Isn't that honest? 00:18:53.000 --> 00:18:59.000 If we're being that honest, can't we kind of say the same? 00:18:59.000 --> 00:19:01.000 So in the darkness of the world around us, 00:19:01.000 --> 00:19:03.000 all of its brokenness and all of its evil, 00:19:03.000 --> 00:19:05.000 and in the darkness of our own hearts, 00:19:05.000 --> 00:19:07.000 which like Paul says in Romans 7, 00:19:07.000 --> 00:19:09.000 you know, I do the things that I don't want to do 00:19:09.000 --> 00:19:11.000 and I don't do the things that I want to do, 00:19:11.000 --> 00:19:12.000 wretched man that I am. 00:19:12.000 --> 00:19:14.000 That's the kind of darkness I'm talking about. 00:19:14.000 --> 00:19:19.000 In that kind of darkness, what hope is there? 00:19:19.000 --> 00:19:24.000 Post-Tenebros, the Luxe, after darkness, light. 00:19:24.000 --> 00:19:27.000 That's God's way. 00:19:27.000 --> 00:19:30.000 Our hope is anchored. 00:19:30.000 --> 00:19:34.000 Our hope is founded on the God 00:19:34.000 --> 00:19:40.000 who creates everything out of nothing. 00:19:40.000 --> 00:19:43.000 Our God is the one who speaks into darkness 00:19:43.000 --> 00:19:47.000 and says, exist light, and it does. 00:19:47.000 --> 00:19:50.000 This is the God who calls a pagan moon worshiper 00:19:50.000 --> 00:19:52.000 from the faraway land and says, 00:19:52.000 --> 00:19:56.000 I want you and my family. 00:19:56.000 --> 00:20:00.000 From the nothingness of Ur 00:20:00.000 --> 00:20:03.000 to the concrete existence 00:20:03.000 --> 00:20:07.000 there's a new creation in the family of God. 00:20:07.000 --> 00:20:09.000 Did you know that there's actually three creation stories 00:20:09.000 --> 00:20:11.000 in the book of Genesis? 00:20:11.000 --> 00:20:13.000 Thematically. 00:20:13.000 --> 00:20:15.000 So there's the first couple pages of Genesis, 00:20:15.000 --> 00:20:17.000 of course, are the creation of the world 00:20:17.000 --> 00:20:19.000 and that's what we all think of 00:20:19.000 --> 00:20:22.000 when we think of Genesis and the word creation. 00:20:22.000 --> 00:20:25.000 God speaks things into existence. 00:20:25.000 --> 00:20:29.000 Let there be light. 00:20:29.000 --> 00:20:32.000 The second creation story is in Genesis 9, 00:20:32.000 --> 00:20:34.000 several chapters later. 00:20:34.000 --> 00:20:36.000 The wickedness of the world, the darkness, 00:20:36.000 --> 00:20:40.000 had gotten so deep that God floods the earth 00:20:40.000 --> 00:20:42.000 to cleanse it from wickedness 00:20:42.000 --> 00:20:46.000 and all life is destroyed except Noah and his family 00:20:46.000 --> 00:20:48.000 on the ark. 00:20:48.000 --> 00:20:51.000 Now, if you remember our movie of Genesis, 00:20:51.000 --> 00:20:54.000 in your mind you picture this opening scene 00:20:54.000 --> 00:21:00.000 of the dark, churning, watery mass with no land, life. 00:21:00.000 --> 00:21:02.000 That's the scene of Genesis 9 00:21:02.000 --> 00:21:05.000 as the floodwaters recede and Mount Errorat 00:21:05.000 --> 00:21:08.000 comes out the top. Land emerges from water 00:21:08.000 --> 00:21:12.000 and life is there 00:21:12.000 --> 00:21:15.000 and Noah and his family are saved 00:21:15.000 --> 00:21:18.000 like a new creation. 00:21:18.000 --> 00:21:22.000 And the third creation scene is this passage in Genesis 12. 00:21:22.000 --> 00:21:26.000 From the nothingness and chaos of the pagan nations 00:21:26.000 --> 00:21:31.000 it's like God said, let there be family. 00:21:31.000 --> 00:21:34.000 One of my favorite theologians, Bruce Walke, said, 00:21:34.000 --> 00:21:39.000 the same word that summoned the cosmos into existence 00:21:39.000 --> 00:21:45.000 summons Abraham to bring a nation into existence. 00:21:45.000 --> 00:21:50.000 The nation that would bring forth our Savior, Jesus Christ. 00:21:50.000 --> 00:21:53.000 Our God is the Creator God 00:21:53.000 --> 00:21:56.000 who speaks new creation into existence from nothing. 00:21:56.000 --> 00:22:04.000 So we have nothing to offer God. 00:22:04.000 --> 00:22:07.000 We just can't offer God anything 00:22:07.000 --> 00:22:12.000 and it's into our nothingness that God speaks 00:22:12.000 --> 00:22:19.000 and makes of us a new creation in Christ. 00:22:19.000 --> 00:22:24.000 2 Corinthians 4-6, for God who said, let light shine out of darkness 00:22:24.000 --> 00:22:29.000 has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God 00:22:29.000 --> 00:22:32.000 in the face of Jesus Christ. 00:22:32.000 --> 00:22:36.000 That is the way of God bringing light from darkness, 00:22:36.000 --> 00:22:38.000 bringing new creation out of nothing. 00:22:38.000 --> 00:22:41.000 That's the wisdom and power of God. 00:22:41.000 --> 00:22:43.000 The sort of wisdom and power that says 00:22:43.000 --> 00:22:47.000 if you want to save your life you must lose it. 00:22:47.000 --> 00:22:52.000 The wisdom and power that says the way to eternal life is through death, 00:22:52.000 --> 00:22:56.000 through a cross, 00:22:56.000 --> 00:23:02.000 that the family of God should be spoken into existence from the enemies of God. 00:23:02.000 --> 00:23:07.000 If that's the way of God then what do we have to fear? 00:23:07.000 --> 00:23:13.000 Then no darkness can overshadow our hope 00:23:13.000 --> 00:23:21.000 because it's the deepest darkness that God uses to bring forth the most brilliant light. 00:23:21.000 --> 00:23:26.000 Let me just say a few things in conclusion. 00:23:26.000 --> 00:23:35.000 What's most true about you now, if you're in Christ, is not your inner darkness. 00:23:35.000 --> 00:23:41.000 If you're a Christian, here's what's most true about you now. 00:23:41.000 --> 00:23:48.000 1 Peter 2, you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, 00:23:48.000 --> 00:23:54.000 a people for his own possession that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness 00:23:54.000 --> 00:23:56.000 and into his marvelous light. 00:23:56.000 --> 00:24:00.000 Once you were not a people but now you are God's people. 00:24:00.000 --> 00:24:05.000 Once you had not received mercy but now you have received mercy. 00:24:05.000 --> 00:24:13.000 That is what is most true about you. 00:24:13.000 --> 00:24:18.000 So if that's true about you, live like it. 00:24:18.000 --> 00:24:24.000 If we are children of the day, let's live as though we're in the daytime. 00:24:24.000 --> 00:24:28.000 Let's walk in the light where God is. 00:24:28.000 --> 00:24:30.000 Put away all the works of darkness. 00:24:30.000 --> 00:24:32.000 Put away the secrecy. 00:24:32.000 --> 00:24:34.000 Put away the vileness. 00:24:34.000 --> 00:24:36.000 Put away the sin. 00:24:36.000 --> 00:24:38.000 Put on Jesus. 00:24:38.000 --> 00:24:42.000 Walk in the light of honesty and vulnerability and purity. 00:24:42.000 --> 00:24:44.000 It's where Jesus is. 00:24:44.000 --> 00:24:46.000 It's better. 00:24:46.000 --> 00:24:50.000 Let's live like children of the day. 00:24:50.000 --> 00:24:55.000 But now if that's what 1 Peter says about being a royal priesthood and a holy nation, 00:24:55.000 --> 00:25:03.000 about having received mercy, if that's not true about you, it can be. 00:25:03.000 --> 00:25:07.000 You might say, well, I'm not in the family of God. 00:25:07.000 --> 00:25:09.000 How do I know if God's calling me? 00:25:09.000 --> 00:25:11.000 Maybe he hasn't called me. 00:25:11.000 --> 00:25:12.000 But here's the thing. 00:25:12.000 --> 00:25:22.000 If you'd rather have his light than your darkness, there's so much hope. 00:25:22.000 --> 00:25:26.000 If you can just say, Lord, you are my Lord. 00:25:26.000 --> 00:25:29.000 Just take my darkness and give me your light instead. 00:25:29.000 --> 00:25:34.000 Take my sin and give me your life and goodness. 00:25:34.000 --> 00:25:37.000 I'm messed up, but I'm yours. 00:25:37.000 --> 00:25:41.000 Then you look back on that and say, oh, he has called me. 00:25:41.000 --> 00:25:45.000 That's the proof that he's called you. 00:25:45.000 --> 00:25:50.000 Yes, you'll become an outsider to the world. 00:25:50.000 --> 00:25:54.000 And yes, it will be hard. 00:25:54.000 --> 00:25:57.000 But you'll have somewhere to belong. 00:25:57.000 --> 00:26:01.000 Like you've never belonged anywhere else in the world. 00:26:01.000 --> 00:26:05.000 You'll have a family truer than family, an eternal family. 00:26:05.000 --> 00:26:10.000 Jesus as your big brother, God as your father. 00:26:10.000 --> 00:26:19.000 And you'll have an unshakable hope to put steel in your spine, even in the darkest night. 00:26:19.000 --> 00:26:24.000 Why not? 00:26:24.000 --> 00:26:27.000 Amen.