(# 323) Romans 9 - The Lord is the Source and He is Sovereign to Set the Course

Class Outline:

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Welcome To

BARAH MINISTRIES

a Christian Church

Rory Clark

Pastor-Teacher

 

Good Morning!

 

Welcome to Barah Ministries…a Christian Church based in Mesa, AZ…my name is Pastor Rory Clark.  Barah Ministries teaches the Word of God from God’s perspective and not from the human perspective. 

 

TODAY’S BIBLE LESSON

The Lord is the Source and He is Sovereign to Set the Course

 

First Chronicles, Chapter 29, Verses 10 to 13 say this…

 

FIRST CHRONICLES 29:10

David blessed the Lord in the sight of all the assembly…and David said, “Blessed are You, O Lord, the God of Israel, our Father forever and ever (in other words, You are the eternal One O God).”

 

FIRST CHRONICLES 29:11

“Yours, O Lord, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the victory and the majesty…indeed everything that is in the heavens and on the earth is Yours…Yours is the dominion, O Lord, and You exalt Yourself as head over all.”

 

FIRST CHRONICLES 29:12

“Both riches and honor come from You, and You rule over all, and in Your hand is power and might…and it lies in Your hand to make everyone great and to strengthen everyone.”

 

FIRST CHRONICLES 29:13

“Now therefore, our God, we thank You, and praise Your glorious name.”

 

The Lord Jesus Christ, our God, is the Sovereign God of the Universe.  One writer puts it this way in the matter of the Lord’s Sovereignty…

 

GOD IS SOVEREIGN

God is the sovereign ruler of the universe. There is no higher authority. Our great God possesses every ability He needs to be in absolute control of everything.

 

GOD IS SOVEREIGN

He is all-powerful (omnipotent), so no one can force Him to do anything against His will. He is present everywhere (omnipresent), so no one can hide from Him or escape His scrutiny. He is all-knowing (omniscient), so there is nothing about which He is unaware.

 

GOD IS SOVEREIGN

Nothing occurs without His divine permission. God commands the forces of nature and uses them to achieve His divine purposes. He established the scientific laws that regulate the universe, and only He can overrule their effect.

 

GOD IS SOVEREIGN

Even Satan and his legions of evil spirits can operate only within limits prescribed by God.

 

In Sovereignty, God also directs people, circumstances, and events. Daniel explains, in Daniel, Chapter 2, Verse 21…

 

DANIEL 2:21

“It is the Lord who changes the times and the epochs…He removes kings and He establishes kings…He gives wisdom to wise men and knowledge to men of understanding.”

 

Without God's sustaining hand, none of us could live another day.  Job, Chapter 12, Verse 10 says…

 

JOB 12:10

(The Lord)…in whose hand is the life of every living thing, and the breath of all mankind…

 

The Lord is the SOURCE...He is Sovereign, so He sets your course.

God has made promises to the Jews…the promises He made to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob…promising blessing to their seed…announcing Himself as the God of Israel…promising them Palestine by an oath…promising David a line of perpetual royalty on earth…prophesying a great and glorious future for Israel…all promises made in spite of knowing, in omniscience, that the Jewish race would reject Him and lead him to physical death.  God has made the same promises to us as Church Age believers…God is the SOURCE of everything…have you learned to trust Him for everything or would you rather take matters into your own hands?

 

MUSIC AND REFLECTION

Be Occupied with the Person of the Lord Jesus Christ

Enjoy the Singing of His Praises

 

JESUS THE ONE AND ONLY

Babbie Mason 

 

The opening song for this lesson is JESUS THE ONE AND ONLY sung by BABBIE MASON.

 

OPENING PRAYER

Let us pray...

 

We’re grateful, Heavenly Father, for the privilege of studying Your absolute truth...the Word of God…

 

Father, thank you for the reminder that You are the Sovereign One in the Universe and that You are directing all things…I assure You that in our scurry to make things happen in our lives, we forget that You are at the SOURCE of everything and we are not…nor are other men at the source… only You are the SOURCE…thank you for orchestrating our lives and our lessons and our course…

 

Grant us the patience to stand back and watch Your deliverance…

 

We ask this through the power of God the Holy Spirit…in Christ’s name...

Amen.

 

THE OFFERING

Deacon Denny Goodall

 

Let’s begin this lesson by giving you a chance to make an offering…we

need and we value your financial support…please welcome up Deacon

Denny Goodall with the offering message.

 

OFFERING VERSE

 

MARK 10:27

Looking at them, Jesus said, “With people it is impossible, but not with God…for all things are possible with God.”

 

OFFERING

FLIGHT OF THE EAGLE

Dave McClure, Instrumental

 

TODAY’S BIBLE LESSON

The Lord is the Source and He is Sovereign to Set the Course

 

Our focus in the second passage of Romans, Chapter 9 is the first three verses…Verses 6 to 8…

 

CHAPTER 9 - Passage 2

 

ROMANS 9:6

But it is not as though the word of God has failed. For (in God’s eyes) they are not all Israel who are descended from Israel (in other words…all racial Jews are not spiritual Jews)…

 

ROMANS 9:7

…nor are they all children (of God) because they are Abraham’s descendants… but … “through Isaac your descendants will be named.”

 

ROMANS 9:8

That is, it is not the children (the born ones) of the flesh (Ishmael’s seed) who are children of God, but it is the children (the born ones) of the promise (Abraham’s seed…the born ones of God that) are regarded (by God) as descendants (of Abraham).

 

I have been reflecting on God’s Sovereignty…and this morning, as I reflected on this wonderful subject, I had occasion to put my arms down…to stop flailing in the fight.  My life has been a life of bravado…a life constructed on the sands of fear.  Surely such a life washes away at the first hint of rain, and the Lord is constantly telling me so…I have just been too busy to listen.  The Lord has been giving me the exact life I have purposed in my heart and I have been too busy to notice.  You see, in bravado, I have all the answers…I can make it happen…I get knocked down, and I get up again, think you’re ever gonna keep me down?  However, I have spent this week being mad that my plans never seem to come to fruition…my pleasures never seem to be very pleasurable.

 

I have been an ordained Pastor for nearly nine years, and it’s Pastor John Farley’s fault that I was ordained…he led the committee that ordained me which is God’s Sovereignty at work…interesting that the person I led to a biblical life would become a Pastor before I did…never saw that coming… and that Pastor John would then be ordained by God to ordain me.  You see I can see the humor in that situation and I can enjoy knowing that God’s hand was at work.  How about you?  Can you see God’s hand at work in constructing your life while you are too busy to notice?

 

As a Pastor, I have been cut and I’ve been wounded…both deserved and undeserved wounds…I only notice the undeserved ones…and I have learned…for I know God is teaching me the secret of contentment regardless of circumstances.  But I am not content…and I am not patient…and I want it all now, even though I know that Peter is right in Second Peter, Chapter 3, Verse 8…

 

SECOND PETER 3:8

But do not let this one fact escape your notice, beloved (divinely loved ones), that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years is like one day.

 

God is patient in His orchestration of my life and your life, but I am not patient watching His orchestration…I see the number of people at Barah Ministries slowly dwindling…I see the checkbook slowly emptying…I look at the walls of the church and see pictures of the new church we dream of hanging there almost to taunt me…I drive by the land God has given us to build on…I talk to the architect who wonders when we will build…I know the contractor who will direct the project…I see God orchestrating the project and assembling the pieces, yet much too slowly for me…because in bravado, my life driven on fear, I want to make something happen now.  With God, it is just not that way.  The Lord is the SOURCE and He has set a sovereign course, and there is nothing I can do to speed it up or slow it down, for there are lessons to be learned in preparation for the greatness the Lord has planned for me and you.  Yet it hurts to wait.

 

I would feel bad about my predicament if I didn’t know that greater men than me suffered the same fate…like Abraham…the father of the Jewish race.  God made promises to Abraham…Genesis, Chapter 15, Verses 2 to 4…

 

GENESIS 15:2

Abram said, “O Lord God, what will You give me, since I am childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?”

 

GENESIS 15:3

And Abram said, “Since You have given no offspring to me, one born in my house is my heir.”

 

GENESIS 15:4

Then behold, the word of the Lord came to him, saying, “This man I WILL NOT to be your heir…but one who will come forth from your own body…he shall be your heir.”

 

The Lord couldn’t have been any clearer than this, could He?  And even though Abram believed God…that is, even though he had faith in God…he did not trust God enough to wait for God’s solution.  Instead, Abram took matters into his own hands…a human approach to a divine problem…and human approaches only complicate matters and extend them needlessly.  In Genesis, Chapter 16 we see human interference in a divine plan…

 

GENESIS 16:1

Now Sarai, Abram’s wife had borne him no children, and she had an Egyptian maid whose name was Hagar.

 

GENESIS 16:2

So Sarai said to Abram, “Now behold, the Lord has prevented me from bearing children. Please go in to my maid (have sex with her)…perhaps I will obtain children through her.” And Abram listened to the voice of Sarai.

 

In the legal custom of the day, a barren woman could give her maid to her husband as a wife, and the child born of that union was regarded as the first wife’s child.  The child then became an adopted adult son.  God had other plans.

 

Abram was leading a life of bravado…constructed on the sands of fear…and he and Sari sought to create their own solution.  Yet the Lord is the SOURCE and He is Sovereign to set the course…and Abram and Sari’s choice for themselves was not God’s choice for them…it was a lesser choice…and God did not approve.  Let’s take a quick music break and we’ll see what happened next.

 

MUSIC BREAK

ALIVE

Hillsong

 

TODAY’S BIBLE LESSON

The Lord is the Source and He is Sovereign to Set the Course

 

Welcome back… Romans, Chapter 9, Verses 6 to 8…

 

CHAPTER 9 - Passage 2

 

ROMANS 9:6

But it is not as though the word of God has failed. For (in God’s eyes) they are not all Israel who are descended from Israel (in other words…all racial Jews are not spiritual Jews)…

 

ROMANS 9:7

…nor are they all children (of God) because they are Abraham’s descendants… but … “through Isaac your descendants will be named.”

 

ROMANS 9:8

That is, it is not the children (the born ones) of the flesh (Ishmael’s seed) who are children of God, but it is the children (the born ones) of the promise (Abraham’s seed…the born ones of God that) are regarded (by God) as descendants (of Abraham).

 

Now back to Genesis 16…continuing at Verse 3…

GENESIS 16:3

After Abram had lived ten years in the land of Canaan, Abram’s wife Sarai took Hagar the Egyptian, her maid, and gave her to her husband Abram as his wife.

 

GENESIS 16:4

He went in to (had sex with) Hagar, and she conceived…and when Hagar saw that she had conceived, her mistress Sari was despised in Hagar’s sight.

 

GENESIS 16:5

And Sarai said to Abram, “May the wrong done me be upon you. I gave my maid into your arms, but when she saw that she had conceived, I was despised in her sight. May the Lord judge between you and me.”

 

Sarai blamed Abram for the problem, even though she instigated it.

 

GENESIS 16:6

But Abram said to Sarai, “Behold, your maid is in your power…do to her what is good in your sight.” So Sarai treated Hagar harshly, and she fled from Sarai’s presence.

 

Abram, like Adam in the Garden of Eden, followed the wrong advice of his wife.  Then Abram abdicated his responsibility to handle the problem, as head of the household…and the one with the “heir,” Hagar, fled.  When we abandon the way of faith in favor of human plans, things go south.  But God intervenes.

 

GENESIS 16:7

Now the angel of the Lord (the angel of Yahweh) found Hagar by a spring of water in the wilderness, by the spring on the way to Shur.

 

GENESIS 16:8

The angel said, “Hagar, Sarai’s maid, where have you come from and where are you going?” And she said, “I am fleeing from the presence of my mistress Sarai.”

 

GENESIS 16:9

Then the angel of the Lord said to her, “Return to your mistress, and submit

yourself to her authority.”

 

GENESIS 16:10

Moreover, the angel of the Lord said to her, “I will greatly multiply your descendants so that they will be too many to count.”

 

Very similar to the promise to Abraham…and these descendants would be the Arabs…who are hostile to the Jews to this very day.

 

GENESIS 16:11

The angel of the Lord said to her further, “Behold, you are with child, and you will bear a son…and you shall call his name Ishmael (which means ‘God  hears’), because the Lord has given heed to your affliction.

 

GENESIS 16:12

“He will be a wild donkey of a man, his hand will be against everyone,

and everyone’s hand will be against him…and he will live to the east of all his brothers.”

 

Human plans turn into an abomination and we reap the harvest of such an abomination…yet the Sovereign Lord still accomplishes His good purpose.

 

GENESIS 16:13

Then Hagar called the name of the Lord who spoke to her, “You are a God who sees (after me)” … for she said, “Have I even remained alive here after seeing Him?”

 

GENESIS 16:14

Therefore the well was called Beer-lahai-roi…behold, it is between Kadesh and Bered.

 

Beer-lahai-roi…the well of the living one who sees after me…

 

GENESIS 16:15

So Hagar bore Abram a son…and Abram called the name of his son, whom Hagar bore, Ishmael.

 

GENESIS 16:16

Abram was eighty-six years old when Hagar bore Ishmael to him.

In her barrenness, a helplessness and hopelessness, Sarai should have called out to the Lord for a solution to her bareness problem.  Instead she took matters into her own hands, and things didn’t work out.  In fact, her decision produced a race of people who would forever be hostile to Abram’s seed.

 

The lesson is clear…God is Sovereign…we are not.  We are to have faith in the Lord and wait for His fulfillment of the plans He has for us.  First Peter, Chapter 5, Verses 6 and 7 outline the way…

 

FIRST PETER 5:6

Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you at the proper time…

 

FIRST PETER 5:7

…casting all your anxiety on Him, because He cares for you.

 

God considers all of our problems to be His responsibility…in prayer… make your requests know to God…and in your helplessness, He will be helpful.  The Lord is the SOURCE…let Him set your sovereign course.

 

GOD WANTS YOU!

Make the Most Important Decision of Your Life

 

ROMANS 1:16

For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God the Father…divine omnipotence…to provide salvation to everyone who believes in the Lord Jesus Christ…to the Jew first and also to the Greek (Gentiles).

 

MATTHEW 7:13

“Enter salvation through the narrow gate (the Lord Jesus Christ)…for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction…and there are many who enter through it.”

 

MATTHEW 7:14

“For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to the resurrection life, and there are few who find it.”

 

JOHN 10:9

“I (the Lord Jesus Christ) am the door to salvation…if anyone enters through believing in Me…he will be saved…and then he will go in and out and find pasture.”

 

FIRST CORINTHIANS 15:22

For all in union with Adam are set to die the second death in the Lake of Fire…but all those in union with Christ will live the resurrection life.

 

CLOSING SONG

WHAT CAN SEPARATE YOU 

June Murphy

 

CLOSING PRAYER

Let us pray...

 

THANKS - INTERCESSION - PETITION

 

Thanks for coming!

Thanks for watching!

Thanks for listening!

www.barahministries.com