SPEAKER_01: Ministering to the heart of Western Arkansas's River Valley for over 165 years, welcome to Chapter and First, the Bible Teaching Ministry of Fort Smith's First Baptist Church.
SPEAKER_01: You'll find sermons and teachings from Pastor Greg, our ministry staff, and guest speakers.
SPEAKER_01: Thank you for listening.
SPEAKER_00: Hello, church family.
SPEAKER_00: A little bit different today.
SPEAKER_00: If you're watching this, it means that the ice has hit and created all those things we have.
SPEAKER_00: So here I am.
SPEAKER_00: I'm wearing my flannel.
SPEAKER_00: I got my coffee, and I hope you're doing the same and are safe at home.
SPEAKER_00: And we just wanted to give you a word of encouragement since we are all in this experience of the ice and storm.
SPEAKER_00: In fact, as you know, we love coffee.
SPEAKER_00: Pastor Greg loves coffee.
SPEAKER_00: I want to show you my favorite, one of my absolute favorite coffee cups here.
SPEAKER_00: Janet and I got this at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C.
SPEAKER_00: And it says, coffee, and you look at it on this side, it says, the favorite drink of the civilized world, quoting no less of an authority than Thomas Jefferson, a quote he made in 1824.
SPEAKER_00: And he certainly was right.
SPEAKER_00: It is the drink of the civilized world.
SPEAKER_00: So I hope you've been warm, cozy, safe, with lots of coffee and lots of chili.
SPEAKER_00: I do want to give you just a word of encouragement since we're not able to be in that church setting.
SPEAKER_00: We can still have church and be the church together.
SPEAKER_00: Let me pray for you and then I'll give you a word from the Word.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, we love you and we thank you.
SPEAKER_00: We pray that you keep people safe.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, I pray that you keep our church family safe.
SPEAKER_00: I pray for first responders and folks who are working on utilities and cleaning streets and all the different people that are out there trying to help us walk through this journey.
SPEAKER_00: I pray you'll keep them safe and bless them.
SPEAKER_00: We thank you for technology, and I thank you for our team, Bobby Dyer and his folks that help us have the capacity to be able to be an encouragement to the church and still have this time of worship and study together.
SPEAKER_00: I pray you'll bless our time, that you will be our teacher from your word in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Just want to give you a word, keep you encouraged in your movement forward as we study the Bible chronologically using the Bible recap platform that guides us on our daily Bible readings.
SPEAKER_00: In our Bible readings, we have gone through the life of Abraham, and I wanted to preach on Abraham today.
SPEAKER_00: So I want to give you a word from the life of Abraham.
SPEAKER_00: The other thing that we're doing, why are we doing this chronological study?
SPEAKER_00: Why are we taking the challenge to every day work our way through God's Word?
SPEAKER_00: Well, it's a part of the challenge that we have as a church as we move through 2026, the call to move forward.
SPEAKER_00: We've set that up and we'll be working through that all year.
SPEAKER_00: And it is the challenge for us to move forward as individuals in our faith walk with Christ.
SPEAKER_00: A challenge for us as a church to elevate what we're doing, to move forward, to pursue more of what God has for us.
SPEAKER_00: Now, Abraham is an excellent role model and example for us in the pursuit of Jesus, always moving forward for what God has for us.
SPEAKER_00: Now, our theme verse for that comes from Philippians chapter 3.
SPEAKER_00: And I want to remind you of this passage of scripture.
SPEAKER_00: It's a well-known passage of scripture.
SPEAKER_00: If you've been in church, you know it.
SPEAKER_00: We've used it here, but I want you to see it through the example of a real-life man in real-life situations, Abraham, as we've just finished reading his life.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible says this, Philippians chapter 3, verse 12, not that I have already obtained or have already been made complete, but I, Paul, press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, I'm going to get all of that growth, that being transformed to be like Jesus, all of those things that Jesus saved me for, that he laid hold of my life to be, I want to pursue those and get what he has saved me for.
SPEAKER_00: Brothers, Paul said, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of that.
SPEAKER_00: Paul said, I hadn't graduated to the perfection of Jesus yet.
SPEAKER_00: I still have so much more to learn and so much more for God to do in my life.
SPEAKER_00: He says, one thing I do, because he has not reached that place yet, one thing I do, forgetting what is behind and straining towards what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: All of us who are mature should take this view of things.
SPEAKER_00: And if in some point in your life you think differently, that God will make that clear to you.
SPEAKER_00: Only let us live up to what we have already attained.
SPEAKER_00: And Paul says right there, I am pressing forward, I am moving on.
SPEAKER_00: Paul at the end of his life, the end of his ministry, and all he had accomplished, said, I hadn't gotten there yet.
SPEAKER_00: I am still committed to one thing, one thing I do, and that's to press forward for what God has for me.
SPEAKER_00: And Abraham, as we've read over our readings, exemplifies that in an incredible way.
SPEAKER_00: Let me give you three ways that Abraham modeled what Paul has challenged us to do and what we are trying to do as a church.
SPEAKER_00: First of all, it's the commitment forward, the commitment to go forward.
SPEAKER_00: Where does that commitment come from?
SPEAKER_00: It comes from God's promises, and it comes from God's calling in our lives.
SPEAKER_00: In Genesis chapter 12, God showed up in Abraham's life, and he called him to go to another country that God was preparing for him.
SPEAKER_00: And he told Abraham, I'm going to make you a great nation.
SPEAKER_00: Through your children and your grandchildren and your progeny, I am going to use you to bless the world.
SPEAKER_00: Your inheritance, your people that will follow you, all of that.
SPEAKER_00: I am giving that to you, and I will use you and that process to bless the world.
SPEAKER_00: And so Abraham in Genesis chapter 12 leaves his home and he goes to that country that God has called him to.
SPEAKER_00: Man, that you talk about an incredible step of faith.
SPEAKER_00: He was going somewhere he'd never been, place he'd never seen, and he is going solely on the promise of God and God's calling in his life.
SPEAKER_00: I'm going to do this through you.
SPEAKER_00: So he calls him not just to a place, he gives him a promise, but he gives him a greater vision of what he's going to do in his life.
SPEAKER_00: I am going to use you to bless others, to do my work in and through your life.
SPEAKER_00: And in a lot of ways, that's very similar to the call that we have.
SPEAKER_00: Paul talks about his vision for his life.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus saved me for this.
SPEAKER_00: And I want to press forward and take a hold of what Jesus has put in front of me, what he's promised to do.
SPEAKER_00: And so Paul has that same sense of a promise, the same sense of calling and vision in his life.
SPEAKER_00: He knew that Jesus saved him for a reason, saved him for a purpose.
SPEAKER_00: He wants to use him to bless others and to impact others and to advance the gospel.
SPEAKER_00: He told Abraham the same thing.
SPEAKER_00: I have a work I'm going to do in your life, and then I have a work I'm going to do through your life, blessing others and impacting others and bringing the Redeemer into the world.
SPEAKER_00: And friends, when you are saved, when you give your life to Jesus, Paul is making it clear, Jesus laid a hold of your life for a purpose.
SPEAKER_00: He has a calling for you.
SPEAKER_00: He has promises to use you.
SPEAKER_00: Paul wrote in Ephesians chapter 2, when we are saved, we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works.
SPEAKER_00: He has prepared beforehand for us to walk in.
SPEAKER_00: Your life, my life, is not any different than Abraham's life.
SPEAKER_00: Abraham pursued what God has for him.
SPEAKER_00: Even when it didn't make sense, even when he didn't know what it was, he gave up everything and he forsakes home, he forsakes family, he forsakes whatever desire for wealth he might have to do it his way, and he follows God and pursues him.
SPEAKER_00: He goes to battle on behalf of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: He gives his son Isaac on behalf of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: He has a vision that God has given him of what he's going to do.
SPEAKER_00: And friends, we are doing this study.
SPEAKER_00: We are digging into God's word so that we can learn lessons like this.
SPEAKER_00: Our God is a mighty God, and he is on the march, and he is always on the march, and he has a plan for redemption, and he is working out that plan and he calls us to be a part of it.
SPEAKER_00: How are you doing in that walk?
SPEAKER_00: Do you see that call in your life?
SPEAKER_00: Do you view your spiritual life that way?
SPEAKER_00: That it is something that is never static and never settled, and it is always moving forward because there's no way we'll ever get all of what Jesus saved us to be and to do.
SPEAKER_00: But we want to pursue it with our all and get as much of that as we can possibly do by pursuing the Lord and letting do that in our lives.
SPEAKER_00: Second thing Paul says, exampled in the life of Abraham, he says, I am forgetting what is behind.
SPEAKER_00: He says, I am committed to pursuing forward, but that means leaving behind what is behind.
SPEAKER_00: Now, if there's anybody that would understand that, Paul, at the end of his life writing this, had planted churches, carried the gospel around the world, had preached to government leaders.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, he had done so much, but Paul says, listen, none of that matters.
SPEAKER_00: There is still so much ahead that Jesus has for me and saved me for.
SPEAKER_00: I am not going to stand on those laurels.
SPEAKER_00: You think about Abraham's life.
SPEAKER_00: Abraham is one of the greatest models of a life billed by faith.
SPEAKER_00: He left his home to go to the land that God had called him to.
SPEAKER_00: God said, Through you, you're going to have children and offspring and all of that.
SPEAKER_00: And Abraham and his wife Sarah had to have faith as old people past the childbearing years to step out in faith, to do what you do to have children, even though you're past that thing, to have hope and to have belief.
SPEAKER_00: And God gave them Isaac as a son.
SPEAKER_00: Abraham fought battles that we saw where he stepped out in faith when evil kings had conquered the land of Sodom and had captured Lot and his family and all of their possessions.
SPEAKER_00: Abraham, with some allies, went and attacked those evil kings who outnumbered him greatly to redeem his family, Lot and his family, and all of that.
SPEAKER_00: And the Bible says he won this great victory and he gave God credit for that.
SPEAKER_00: And the story of the Old Testament high priest Melchizedek.
SPEAKER_00: Abraham gave God all the glory and gave a tenth of everything he had to worship God for that victory.
SPEAKER_00: All of these victories that Abraham had had.
SPEAKER_00: And yet he wouldn't stand on his laurels.
SPEAKER_00: We read the story, the famous story in Scripture of Isaac as a young person, and God calls Abraham to go sacrifice him as an act of worship to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Knowing that God had said through Isaac, you're going to have offspring, and that offspring will explode, and you'll have as many as the sands of the beach or as the stars in the sky.
SPEAKER_00: And yet Abraham has to wrestle with this test of faith.
SPEAKER_00: And the Bible says he took Isaac, put him on an altar, and he raised his knife to kill him.
SPEAKER_00: The book of Hebrews tells us that that was an incredible act of faith because as Abraham did that, he believed that God was the God of resurrection.
SPEAKER_00: And if he sacrificed Isaac, God would return Isaac to him as the God of resurrection and the God who was working out his plan.
SPEAKER_00: And Abraham, he could have rested on his laurels.
SPEAKER_00: He could have said, Listen, God, I have all these great victories for you, and you've given me Isaac, so I'm fine, we're good, I'm just going to stay there.
SPEAKER_00: But Abraham wouldn't do that.
SPEAKER_00: He was willing to sacrifice everything in his life and whatever was behind to pursue the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Abraham would not let failures keep him from pursuing the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Abraham had great victories, but he had some pretty terrible failures.
SPEAKER_00: Twice he lied about his wife Sarah being his sister because she was beautiful apparently, and the kings that they would visit would want her and take her away from him, and he didn't want to get killed, and he in panic begged her to lie and say she was just his sister, trying to save his life.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it was terrible.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know about you.
SPEAKER_00: If I got away with that the first time with my wife, it sure wouldn't happen the second time.
SPEAKER_00: And yet, God worked through those failures.
SPEAKER_00: And when he had the failure with him and his wife and their lack of faith, and she gives Abraham her handmaid, and he has a child with her, and God says, That is not the plan, that is not how I told you that would happen, and that is not the error through which I will do this.
SPEAKER_00: All of these types of failures Abraham had, and yet he kept pressing forward.
SPEAKER_00: He never let his failures keep him from pursuing the Lord or prevent him from doing what God had called him to do.
SPEAKER_00: So many times in our lives we'll think, well, I messed up and God can't use me anymore.
SPEAKER_00: Listen, God's grace is greater than all of our sin.
SPEAKER_00: There is nothing you can do if you are a child of God to separate yourself from Him.
SPEAKER_00: Not that our sin doesn't have consequences, and we certainly see in the life of Abraham there were significant consequences from that whole story of Sarah and her handmaid and Ishmael, the son, and all of the struggles that flowed from that and continue to flow out of that mistake.
SPEAKER_00: And so all of those things happen.
SPEAKER_00: But listen, they never keep God from accomplishing his plans.
SPEAKER_00: One of the principles that we've studied and are studying as we read through Scripture is God's plans are immutable and nothing defeats his plan of redemption, his accomplishing what he's purposed to do.
SPEAKER_00: And Paul says that, and Abraham models that.
SPEAKER_00: No, Paul says, I forget what's behind and I pursue ahead.
SPEAKER_00: Abraham didn't let his victories lull into sleep, or his failures cause him to stop walking by faith with God, pursuing what God had for him.
SPEAKER_00: Paul said, one thing I'm committed to, I'm looking ahead.
SPEAKER_00: He says, I'm forgetting what's behind.
SPEAKER_00: And the third point I want you to see is why.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: It is our identity as a follower of Jesus to always be pursuing the Lord and what he has for us.
SPEAKER_00: Paul says that in two ways.
SPEAKER_00: He says, I press on to take hold of that, those truths, that work, that thing, for which Christ Jesus took a hold of me.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus saved us for a purpose and to a calling and to an identity in who we are in Him.
SPEAKER_00: As His children, we are in a process of being used by Him to model the gospel and to spread the gospel.
SPEAKER_00: We are in a process of being changed and shaped and transformed into His image, a process that never stops.
SPEAKER_00: It is our identity as a Christian that we're moving forward.
SPEAKER_00: Paul doesn't give us some ideal that we go, oh, that sure would be nice to do that.
SPEAKER_00: Or, oh, I'm encouraged or motivated by that, and so I feel better because of that.
SPEAKER_00: No, no, it is not that kind of a thing.
SPEAKER_00: It is literally the identity of who we are.
SPEAKER_00: That God never stops working in our life and he never stops calling us forward, and he never stops growing us, and he's progressively changing us and doing deeper work and stronger work in us, and he never stops, and we're not allowed to stop.
SPEAKER_00: It is our identity for which Jesus saved us.
SPEAKER_00: And then Paul says, listen, that's who our, that's what it means to be a mature Christian.
SPEAKER_00: And verse 15, all of us who are mature should take such a view of things.
SPEAKER_00: If you have any maturity in your spiritual life, that maturity demands that you understand there is more that Jesus has saved you for.
SPEAKER_00: Like we don't stop.
SPEAKER_00: And then Paul says his prayer, at some point, if you think differently, I'm praying that God too will make that clear to you.
SPEAKER_00: And so that's why we have this theme of moving forward.
SPEAKER_00: That's why we're challenging ourselves to have a deeper study of God's word and to expand our knowledge of God's word because we know that God is working and we are challenging ourselves.
SPEAKER_00: God, show us where we can do more.
SPEAKER_00: Show us where we can be more.
SPEAKER_00: Show us where we can be transformed more to be like you.
SPEAKER_00: Show us where we can step out in faith more.
SPEAKER_00: Show us where you want to work in our lives.
SPEAKER_00: And we're praying that individually, and we're praying that collectively together as a church.
SPEAKER_00: And so we know that God is going to show us places because we're mature, not because we're immature or not because we're, you know, failing or whatever, but it's because we're mature that God is showing us more and where we can go forward.
SPEAKER_00: And so we didn't want to miss a weekend to encourage each other, to remind each other about moving forward.
SPEAKER_00: We didn't want to miss a weekend where we captured these lessons from Scripture, like the life of Abraham, that helped us move forward, helped us mature, and helped us pursue to take hold of what Jesus has taken hold of our lives to do.
SPEAKER_00: I pray that's an encouragement to you.
SPEAKER_00: Enjoy your coffee, enjoy your family time together, be safe.
SPEAKER_00: Let me pray for you as we close.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, we love you and we thank you.
SPEAKER_00: Even in the midst of times like this, of sort of out-of-kilter and things are messed up in schedules and all of that, we can still get together and encourage each other.
SPEAKER_00: You are still speaking to us as we read through daily your word.
SPEAKER_00: And I pray that as we see the examples of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, and now as we move into the life of Moses in the next few days, Lord, I pray that these men will be examples to us.
SPEAKER_00: Real life people with victories and struggles who have a sense of your calling and purpose.
SPEAKER_00: They're not letting the mistakes or the victories of the past prevent them from moving forward.
SPEAKER_00: And help us see and grow in our maturity to know that this is exciting.
SPEAKER_00: It is wonderful to grow to be more like you and to grow closer to you.
SPEAKER_00: I pray that for our church family.
SPEAKER_00: Keep them safe, keep them blessed, speak to them through their quiet time as they read your word.
SPEAKER_00: We thank you most of all for Jesus, who has taken a hold of our lives through salvation in Him.
SPEAKER_00: In His name we pray.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Blessings to you and your family.
SPEAKER_00: We will see you soon as soon as the weather clears.
SPEAKER_01: We pray this message has been a blessing to you and helped to strengthen your walk with Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Please know we want to minister to you and pray for you.
SPEAKER_01: Send an email to contact us at fsfbc.org and let us pray for you and help you in any way we can.
SPEAKER_01: Thank you for listening to Chapter and First, the Bible Teaching Ministry of Fort Smith's First Baptist Church.