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Sacramento Central SDA Church

Biblical Missionaries

Chris Buttery

The Missionary Nature of God

Abraham: The First Missionary

The Unlikely Missionary

The Jonah Saga

Exiles As Missionaries

Peter and the Gentiles

Background and Call

Paul: Mission & Message

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And so, we're launching right into our second lesson for the new quarter's study on biblical missionaries.

Hope you've got your Bibles open and you've got your lesson studies as well available.

We're going to be talking about the first great, or the first missionary.

And his name is Abraham, that's right, Abraham is the great missionary, or that first missionary.

Last week's lesson we talked about and looked at how God's heart is a missionary heart.

And the only reason and the need for mission is to salvage and save that which is lost, to find that which is lost.

And so God's heart of love reached out, sent His Son, came, lived, suffered, and died, rose again so that you and I might be saved.

And so, let's, we're going to track throughout this quarter the different missionaries that the Scriptures highlight and hopefully we can learn a few things as we navigate our way through these stories and enjoy them.

This morning, of course, we're talking about Abraham.

Let's take a look at our Memory Texas, Galatians chapter 3, verses 6 through 8.

I'll be reading from the New King James Version, and it says, Just as Abraham believed God and it was accounted to him for righteousness.

Therefore, know that only those who are of faith are sons of Abraham and the scripture foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith preached the gospel to Abraham beforehand saying, in you all the nations shall be blessed.

We may be, as some of you may be familiar with the British explorer Sir Francis Drake, who sailed from England in December of 1577 with 6 ships and 164 sailors.

His mission was simply to be the first Englishman to circumnavigate the entire globe.

And 3 years later, with just 1 ship and 59 surviving sailors, he limped into Plymouth Harbour.

While ultimately successful in his mission and their mission, Sir Francis and his men had endured a litany of horrors.

They'd endured storms, they'd endured shipwrecks, attacks by hostile peoples, and they also endured starvation.

When you go on a mission, it's not always easy, it's not always easy, in fact, it's often very difficult, as was the case with Sir Francis Drake.

When we think about great men of old, for example, like Enoch and Noah, and whom God had called on a mission for Him.

Now they didn't go as missionaries per se and leave the area where they were living, but they were on a mission for God.

Enoch, we're told, and Jude, proclaimed and preached the return of Christ.

And Noah, of course, we know what his message was, repent and get on the boat, a storm, a flood is coming.

And certainly, it wouldn't have been easy for them.

All we need to do is go to Genesis chapter 6 verse 5 and the Bible records that the thoughts and intents of the people's hearts was evil continually and we know only 8 people got on Noah's ark and so we know that his mission was successful in saving 8, but not successful in saving all.

He endured difficulties and trials and challenges or so, and it wouldn't have been easy, but these individuals were faithful in their responsibility.

The dictionary defines a missionary as a person on a religious mission to a foreign country.

That's what missionary means, and it's interesting, the dictionary highlights the endeavors of Christianity in particular.

And so, a missionary is a person sent on a religious mission to a foreign country.

The Manila Adventist Medical Center Church Choir is on a mission this summer.

You're here visiting and traveling around and sharing the gospel and song and be singing over at the General Conference coming up here very shortly.

Going on a mission, leaving what you're used to and what you're familiar with to share the gospel in foreign lands.

And the first true missionary, because he left his homeland at the request of God, was Abraham, the first recorded missionary.

Through that first call to leave his native home, God had promised that through him a knowledge of salvation, justification by faith, would come to all nations, and Abraham was to witness to those of another land about the true God.

So God had sent Abraham on a mission and to share the good news of salvation.

So we're gonna go over to Sunday's lesson.

Let's go to Genesis chapter 12 in our Bibles.

Genesis chapter 12, let's take a look here at the story of Abraham.

Actually, the story of Abraham begins in Genesis chapter 11.

We normally pick it up in chapter 12 verses 1 to 3 where God asks Abraham to leave his home country and through Abraham God would bless him as he would be a blessing to the nations.

But Abraham is first mentioned in Genesis chapter 11 and you can read the story in verses 26 to 32.

And in Genesis 11, 26 to 32, Abraham is introduced to us for the first time as Abram.

He doesn't get a name change until Genesis 17 and verse 5.

Abraham's original name was Abram and Abram means father of elevation or exalted father, that's what Abram means, which was a name that pointed to his honoured position as an ancestor of Shem.

And Shem was a part of that unbroken line of faithful men, starting with Adam and his son, Seth, and then of course we move to Enoch and Methuselah and Noah, etc.

And so these men served God, and through that lineage of Seth, we come to the story of Abram.

And so just turn with me to chapter 12, if you're there, we'll look at verses 1 through 3.

Now the Lord had said to Abram, "'Get out of your country, from your family, "'and from your father's house, "'to a land that I will show you.

"'I will bless you and make your name great, "'and you shall be a blessing.

"'I will bless those who bless you, "'and I'll curse him who curses you, and in you all the families of the earth shall be what?

God said, okay, you need to leave and I'm going to bless you and you're going to be a blessing to the nations, you see.

And so, Abraham grew up in the Ur of the Chaldees, or the Ur of the Chaldees, and that is, of course, in Iraq, what we know as Iraq today, and Ur was northeast of the Persian Gulf.

If you just run up from the Persian Gulf and go a little bit northeast, you'd run into Ur of the Chaldees.

And it was a hotbed of superstition and heathenism.

Sadly, Abraham's own family had succumbed to the surrounding culture by serving other gods, and you can read that in Joshua chapter 24 and verse 2, where writing there in that book, Abraham's family is said to have left and served other gods.

So in order to preserve the truth about himself, God called Abram or Abraham, along with his household, out of Mesopotamia.

When you read here in chapter 11, the last part of chapter 11, and you get to chapter 12, and you read verse 4, it seems as though God had called Abraham out of Haran.

That's where this call, this message from God came to Abraham from.

But in fact, he was first called from Mesopotamia.

And here's just a couple of references if you wanted to make a note, Genesis 15, 7, Nehemiah 9, 7, and then if you go to the book of Acts, chapter 7, verses 2 and 3, God came to Abraham and said similar words to what we find in Genesis 12, 1 through 3, and called him out of Mesopotamia.

And so he left Mesopotamia with his household, and then in their journey with the family, they traveled about 500 plus miles northeast from Ur, out of Ur, to Haran and there, sadly, Abraham's father, Terah, passed away.

And so, they're in Mesopotamia, in Ur, and God calls Abraham out, he and his family.

They travel to Haran, about 500 miles northeast, and in Haran, Abraham's father Terah dies.

And he dies not having made it to the Promised Land.

They were all on the way to the Promised Land.

But even more serious, even more serious was the fact that Abraham's brother Nahor and his family decided not to continue the journey when God came to Abraham the second time, which is recorded in Genesis 12, and told him to get up out of this place and leave Haran and go to a place that I will show you.

It's a sad testament, but Nahor decided to not claim the promise of God, not journey to the promised land, and so Abraham left his brother and his family behind.

It was under these conditions, under these circumstances, that Abraham obeyed the call of God.

Someone has for me here this morning Hebrews chapter 11, verses 8 through 10.

Okay, Richard's got that, we'll get a mic.

We'll get it to you in just a moment and we'll come right over to you.

So turn with me in your Bibles to Hebrews 11, verses 8 through 10, and as we're just about getting ready to get over there, just wanna draw our attention to that fact again.

God said, Abraham, leave, come out, leave your family, come and travel, and come with, I wanna take you to a land that I want to show you, I'm going to take you to the promised land, a place where you'll be a blessing to others.

And then, when he's getting ready to leave, Nahor decides not to come, not to follow.

Is it possible that some are on the journey today on the way to the promised land, and then they drop off halfway through the journey?

Is it possible that some folk who started out so well, journeying toward the promised land, might not end up making it?

There are certain things that arise that prevent people from continuing on, maybe the hardship of the journey that Nahor considered, maybe he enjoyed it in Haran and said, this is the best place I'm going to find, you can keep on going Abraham.

Is it possible that some people have the same attitude toward heaven and eternity and they start out so well but drop off on the way.

It's a sad testament but these are the conditions that Abraham obeyed the call of God.

Let's read Hebrews chapter 11 verses 8 through 10.

Hebrews 11 8 to 10, by faith Abraham when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive foreign inheritance, obeyed, and he went out, not knowing where he went.

By faith he traveled in the land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise.

For he looked for a city which had foundations, whose builder and maker is God." Thank you very much.

What was so remarkable about Abraham's decision to obey the call of God?

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Biblical Missionaries

Abraham: The First Missionary

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