Pastor Bell's Words To Live By

God always keeps his promises. When God made his promises to Abraham it seemed to him that they would not be fulfilled in his lifetime and to give God a helping hand he had a child with his Egyptian helper Hagar. However, as we later discovered, God does not need our help. He is God all by himself and will fulfil every single promise he has ever made. He said to Abraham, I will make you a great nation (Gen 12:2), today the descendants of Abraham run and administer the greatest nation on the planet.  I will bless you and make your name great so that you will be a blessing (Gen 12:2b). Abraham was a blessing to all those he associated with and today his descendants are still a blessing. I will bless those who bless you and curse those who curse you and in you all the families of the earth will be blessed (Gen 12:3). Abraham experienced all these blessings in his lifetime and so did his immediate descendants and so do all those who now put their trust in the Lord Jesus Christ!

How is this possible you may ask? Well whatever God says he will do will happen. He blessed Abraham so that he and his descendants may show to the whole world the favour of our almighty God. The blessings of Abraham were intended for his descendants, i.e. those descended from the lineage of Isaac and Ishmael. Although some may argue that because Ishmael was an illegitimate son he is exempt from the blessings. Others, particularly the followers of Islam, argue that since Ishmael was the first born son of Abraham, he is the rightful heir. All these argument are superseded by the advent of Jesus. To receive a blessing one must reverse any curses that were working in opposition to the blessing. The descendants of Abraham failed miserably to show the power of God (the power of love) to those around them. They even betrayed God and worshipped idols like their neighbours. It took the advent of the son of God, Jesus, to shed his blood to reverse the curse. So it is written in scripture, cursed is everyone who dies on a tree(Gal 3:13), and by dying on the cross Christ redeemed all who put their faith in him from the curse of the law and gives us access to the Spirit of God through faith in him. So all those who put their faith in Jesus can have access to all the promises of Abraham and more because of what Jesus did on the cross. We are heirs and we did not have to work for it, just exercise our faith.

Read Genesis 12 and Galatians 3