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A Tale of Two Friends
Genesis 13-14
Skip Heitzig

Genesis 13 (NKJV™)
1 Then Abram went up from Egypt, he and his wife and all that he had, and Lot with him, to the South.
2 Abram was very rich in livestock, in silver, and in gold.
3 And he went on his journey from the South as far as Bethel, to the place where his tent had been at the beginning, between Bethel and Ai,
4 to the place of the altar which he had made there at first. And there Abram called on the name of the LORD.
5 Lot also, who went with Abram, had flocks and herds and tents.
6 Now the land was not able to support them, that they might dwell together, for their possessions were so great that they could not dwell together.
7 And there was strife between the herdsmen of Abram's livestock and the herdsmen of Lot's livestock. The Canaanites and the Perizzites then dwelt in the land.
8 So Abram said to Lot, "Please let there be no strife between you and me, and between my herdsmen and your herdsmen; for we are brethren.
9 "Is not the whole land before you? Please separate from me. If you take the left, then I will go to the right; or, if you go to the right, then I will go to the left."
10 And Lot lifted his eyes and saw all the plain of Jordan, that it was well watered everywhere (before the LORD destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah) like the garden of the LORD, like the land of Egypt as you go toward Zoar.
11 Then Lot chose for himself all the plain of Jordan, and Lot journeyed east. And they separated from each other.
12 Abram dwelt in the land of Canaan, and Lot dwelt in the cities of the plain and pitched his tent even as far as Sodom.
13 But the men of Sodom were exceedingly wicked and sinful against the LORD.
14 And the LORD said to Abram, after Lot had separated from him: "Lift your eyes now and look from the place where you are--northward, southward, eastward, and westward;
15 "for all the land which you see I give to you and your descendants forever.
16 "And I will make your descendants as the dust of the earth; so that if a man could number the dust of the earth, then your descendants also could be numbered.
17 "Arise, walk in the land through its length and its width, for I give it to you."
18 Then Abram moved his tent, and went and dwelt by the terebinth trees of Mamre, which are in Hebron, and built an altar there to the LORD.
Genesis 14 (NKJV™)
1 And it came to pass in the days of Amraphel king of Shinar, Arioch king of Ellasar, Chedorlaomer king of Elam, and Tidal king of nations,
2 that they made war with Bera king of Sodom, Birsha king of Gomorrah, Shinab king of Admah, Shemeber king of Zeboiim, and the king of Bela (that is, Zoar).
3 All these joined together in the Valley of Siddim (that is, the Salt Sea).
4 Twelve years they served Chedorlaomer, and in the thirteenth year they rebelled.
5 In the fourteenth year Chedorlaomer and the kings that were with him came and attacked the Rephaim in Ashteroth Karnaim, the Zuzim in Ham, the Emim in Shaveh Kiriathaim,
6 and the Horites in their mountain of Seir, as far as El Paran, which is by the wilderness.
7 Then they turned back and came to En Mishpat (that is, Kadesh), and attacked all the country of the Amalekites, and also the Amorites who dwelt in Hazezon Tamar.
8 And the king of Sodom, the king of Gomorrah, the king of Admah, the king of Zeboiim, and the king of Bela (that is, Zoar) went out and joined together in battle in the Valley of Siddim
9 against Chedorlaomer king of Elam, Tidal king of nations, Amraphel king of Shinar, and Arioch king of Ellasar--four kings against five.
10 Now the Valley of Siddim was full of asphalt pits; and the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah fled; some fell there, and the remainder fled to the mountains.
11 Then they took all the goods of Sodom and Gomorrah, and all their provisions, and went their way.
12 They also took Lot, Abram's brother's son who dwelt in Sodom, and his goods, and departed.
13 Then one who had escaped came and told Abram the Hebrew, for he dwelt by the terebinth trees of Mamre the Amorite, brother of Eshcol and brother of Aner; and they were allies with Abram.
14 Now when Abram heard that his brother was taken captive, he armed his three hundred and eighteen trained servants who were born in his own house, and went in pursuit as far as Dan.
15 He divided his forces against them by night, and he and his servants attacked them and pursued them as far as Hobah, which is north of Damascus.
16 So he brought back all the goods, and also brought back his brother Lot and his goods, as well as the women and the people.
17 And the king of Sodom went out to meet him at the Valley of Shaveh (that is, the King's Valley), after his return from the defeat of Chedorlaomer and the kings who were with him.
18 Then Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine; he was the priest of God Most High.
19 And he blessed him and said: "Blessed be Abram of God Most High, Possessor of heaven and earth;
20 And blessed be God Most High, Who has delivered your enemies into your hand." And he gave him a tithe of all.
21 Now the king of Sodom said to Abram, "Give me the persons, and take the goods for yourself."
22 But Abram said to the king of Sodom, "I have raised my hand to the LORD, God Most High, the Possessor of heaven and earth,
23 "that I will take nothing, from a thread to a sandal strap, and that I will not take anything that is yours, lest you should say, 'I have made Abram rich'--
24 "except only what the young men have eaten, and the portion of the men who went with me: Aner, Eshcol, and Mamre; let them take their portion."

New King James Version®, Copyright © 1982, Thomas Nelson, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Lifestyles of the Righteous and Faithful - Abraham

Abraham has often been called, "the father of faith." In this inspiring series, we study the life of Abraham, an ordinary man who heard the voice of God and "did not waver at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strengthened in faith" (Romans 4:20).

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One of the greatest titles you could ever give a person is the title "friend." It is not the kind of a word that you throw loosely around and just give out to anybody. It is a special designation. It is a title of honor for someone to call you their friend. I looked up as I usually like to do, Webster's definition of "friend." And Webster said a friend is one, "who is attached to another person by affection and esteem." And definition number two, "a favored companion." A favored companion. So, this is not a light-weight designation. It's someone that you give, a title you give to someone that you esteem greatly because of the affection that you have for that person. And while I like Webster's dictionary and the definition of friend, the best definition I have come across is an American-Indian definition, a certain tribe who had no written alphabet until someone came in to create an alphabet and a language. And, unfortunately there were not equivalence from one language to another. There was not an equivalent of the word friend in this Indian language, even once the alphabet was constructed. And so they combined eight words for one word. And when you wanted to call someone a friend, you would say, "one who carries my sorrows upon their back." That was their definition. One who carries my sorrows upon their back. In chapter 13, we get a story of Abram and Lot. They were both relatives and friends, and when you can put that combination together, it's a wonderful combination. To really have the esteem of friendship with a close relative. Lot was Abram's nephew. We read about them back in Chapter 11 and we just see his name mentioned a couple times up until Chapter 13. They were bound together by blood and by the bond of friendship.

I was considering what angle I would approach this chapter this morning. And there's a lot of angles that people approach Chapter 13. They approach it from the angle of God's promises to Abram which are great because God reiterates, repeats His promise in this chapter. Then there's the angle of Abram's disobedience because he took Lot with him and he shouldn't have taken Lot with him because God said, "Leave your family behind and don't bring anybody. Just get out." Then there are people who approach this chapter from the lot of Abram being spiritual and Lot being carnal because Lot wants to go to Sodom and Abram is content with any portion of the land. But the angle that I wish to approach this chapter with this morning is the angle of relationship, which is something that is very important to me. I love to talk about it often because if you take life and boil it down to the basics, you strip away all the other stuff- the veneer, the creature comforts- you boil it down to relationships, it's about the most important thing or the only thing you really have left is relationships with people and relationship with God. And yet that is one of those areas where we are sadly lacking; building meaningful relationships. And I saw in this chapter some wonderful hints for the body of Christ in reaching out to one another and building strong friendships of love within the body of Christ.

I received a letter last week from a friend who moved away and she said something that sort of sums up my feelings. The second paragraph in the letter she said, "I also just want to let you know how much I value your friendship." She wrote this to myself and my wife. "That's something that I've just been really thinking about. The fact that, above everything else next to my relationship with God, my friends are the most important things to me." That's a good lesson to learn.

We pick up the story in the first verse. Not every chapter of the Bible is like that; this one is. "Abram went up from Egypt, he and his wife and all that he had, and Lot went with him, to the South. Abram was very rich in livestock, in silver, and in gold. And he went on his journey from the South as far as Bethel, to the place where his tent had been at the beginning, between Bethel and Ai, to the place of the altar which he had made there at first. And there Abram called on the name of the Lord. Lot also, who went with Abram, had flocks and herds and tents." Verse 5 sort of summarizes about all that we know of Lot up to this point. Lot, who was with Abram. That's all we know about him. We know that he was the nephew of Abram but nothing more was said, and that sort of sums up his whole life, is that he was just with Abram. We are introduced to him back in Chapter 11 and we know that Abram look him to Haran and then down in Chapter 12, verse 4, it says, "Abram departed as the Lord had spoken to him and Lot went with him. And Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran." And then Chapter 13, verse 1, "And Lot was with him." Verse 5, "Lot also, who went with Abram." All we know so far of Lot is that he was hanging out with old uncle Abe. Nothing significant is shared about him until this point and now in this chapter, he starts making some decisions. That's his life. "Hey what do you do what's your name?" "I'm Lot." "What do you do?" "Uh, I'm with him." "That's, that's what I do right now. I'm just with him."

A lot of people, as we have said, think that Abram made a real bad mistake in bringing Lot with him. That he was sinful and wrong because he was supposed to leave everybody behind, including Lot, and make that break with the world and the break with the old relationships that were hindering him so that he could go into the land with a fresh start. However, there is no indication from the scripture that Lot held Abram back. Do you get what I'm saying? Lot did not impede Abram in his walk with the Lord. It seems that Lot made his own choice to follow God and used Abram as a prop. Because the New Testament refers to Lot as a man who was righteous, and went he went to Sodom, his soul was vexed, oppressed, with the unrighteous behavior in Sodom and that Lot himself was a righteous person. So it seems Lot, although Abram was called out of Ur of the Chaldeans, Lot made his own choice to follow God, and he's leaning on Abram as a prop because Abram is this man of faith, this man of strength now and then. And Abram allows this relationship. I think that's important because I see in this a picture of friendship and an important principle in building lasting relationships with people. And that is, we must decide, folks, to develop friendships where we require nothing in return. Where we demand nothing in return. "I am going to be your friend, no strings attached. You just come along with me and I'm going to love you." That is a key and powerful principle in developing relationships. The Bible says, "He who has friends must himself be friendly." And we need to make a conscious choice that we will be a friend and a relationship for somebody else, demanding nothing in return. Relationships do not work without a key ingredient. It's called unconditional love. Unconditional love, when we have it, is, it's the best reflection of the love God has for us. You are never more like Jesus than when you love unconditionally. And you are never more like the devil than when you enter a relationship for merely selfish reasons, because that's the character of the enemy. The character of God is unconditional love and selflessness and it seems that Abram had this toward Lot.

Think for a minute how God accepts us. God accepts us on an as-is basis. He takes you as you are. Every gone to a garage sale and found something you like, but it was beaten up a little bit and is says, "Twenty-five dollars as-is." That means, its workable but it's going to take some work, and if you want it, pay this little some of money and you gotta take it as it is. God loves us as-is. God loved us when we were totally unrighteous and absolutely unlovable. And for relationships to work among ourselves, we need to accept one another as-is; warts, flaws and all. We have cracks in our character and meaningful relationships are really build on the acceptance of those things. Abram demanded nothing in return and, really, Lot at this point didn't contribute anything to Abram's life. He just tagged along, he was hanging out with him. But Abram didn't demand anything else. I found something I'd like to read to you from a professor from Loyola University in Chicago who speaks about how to test friendships. It was in a Christian book I read.

The tests that have been applied to friendships throughout the ages apply very well today. If you find, for example, that there are people you can't be with unless you're doing something together — skiing, playing handball, going to a play; in other words, a third thing to which you both direct your attention — then that person may not be as good of a friend as you think. The real test of friendship is: Can you literally do nothing with that other person? Can you enjoy together those moments of life that are utterly simple? They are the moments that people look back on at the end of life and number as the most sacred experiences they've ever had.

Lot was just with Abram- that's his description. And now we get to a conflict. Look at verse 6. "Now the land was not able to support them." Here's these friends hanging out together, enjoying the relationship, but, "the land was not able to support them that they might dwell
together, for their possessions were so great that they could not dwell together. And there was strife between the herdsmen of Abram’s livestock and the herdsmen of Lot’s livestock. The Canaanites and the Perrizzites then dwelt in the land." Did you notice that there is not a conflict here between Abram and Lot? Or excuse me, between the Canaanites and Lot? Or between the Canaanites and Abram? But that there's a conflict between the family members. It mentions that there's these enemies- these Canaanites that are in the land watching. And that's an important factor we'll see in a moment. But right now, Abram and his armies are not fighting against the Canaanites and Lot isn't fighting against the Canaanites. The real problem is with the family.

Now, I am the youngest in my family. I have three older brothers. We were all strong-willed, rowdy little kids. We got along for the most part. But there were those times when my little five foot, one mom had to push us in line because we were so rowdy. And, in growing up, we had a lot of friends in the neighborhood all around the block. The roughest times in relationships, I found, was not with my friends outside the family, but with my brothers inside the family because we're so close. We shared bedrooms, we shared dinner tables. And because we're much closer, there was much more rivalry going on. I threw my brother through the plain glass window in front of the house one week. Two weeks later my parents were gone, he threw me through the replaced window. And my mom and dad could tell you story after story of just how rowdy we were when we let our anger get away with us. Um, don't be surprised, please don't be surprised to find conflict within the family of God. A lot of people are discouraged by this. They can't figure it out. They think there needs to be perfect euphoria and utopia within the body of Christ and they get really discouraged that Christians, in some cases, don't get along and it absolutely astonishes them. We are siblings. We have our own little quirks, we have our own little desires, and when things don't get our way, like every normal human being, saved or not saved, we start itching. Now our family is not 2.5 children but millions and millions of people around the world. And there is strife within the body of Christ. I'm not excusing it. I'm saying, don't be discouraged or downtrodden. In fact in one sense, expect it. We're so close, we're serving the same Lord, we're trying to get adjusted in the same family, there's bound to be conflict somewhere. The book of Acts shows conflict after conflict after conflict all the way through. One of my favorite poems that I share with you every time I talk about this subject says, "To dwell above with those we love? That will be grace and glory. But to live below with those we know. That's another story." That's the truth, isn't it?

But here again is a key step in a rewarding, meaningful relationship with another person and that is this: we need to decide to work past the point of pain. Let me explain that. Any time a relationship is established between two people, it begins very superficial, or very infatuated kind of a way. We shake hands, we greet, we smile, we think we like that person, he has a nice smile or nice eyes, or they have a nice personality. When you really start getting close to a person, and you married couples know what I mean, there is an adjustment period, isn’t there? And there comes a point where you become vulnerable, you open yourself up to the person. You want them to accept them for who you are. There's a conflict, many times, when you are vulnerable. It's a risk that you take in relationships. And any time you take that risk, there's pain involved. There's pain in working through those tough areas in a relationship. At that point, a lot of people close up. They put up a wall. They are very standoffish, and they refuse to work past that point of pain. When you decide to work past those painful areas, the relationship is more beautiful; it blossoms. There is an acceptance, a warmth, a love that you've never felt before. And the key is to accept the conflict and then work past that point. Don't strive for absolutely no conflict. You are striving for something that doesn't exist. And the problem isn't the conflict, it's how you work it out. Working past the point of pain. Um, there's a scripture that, uh, is one of my favorite because I quote it quite often. Listen to this. Jesus said, "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because He has anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor. He has sent me to heal the broken-hearted. Preach deliverance to the captives. Recovery of sight to the blind. Set at liberty those who are oppressed. Preach the acceptable year of the Lord." Did you notice the names of those people? Listen again, "Poor, broken-hearted, captive, blind, oppressed." Now that makes for a pretty messy group of people when you stick them together in one room like this. Alright? Do you get what I'm saying? Now that's us. We're stuck together in the hospital. And we're bleeding a little bit here, and we're messed up a little bit here and he's blind and she's oppressed and they're all broken-hearted. And that's what the church is for and they get together, you're bound to have conflicts. Again, I am not excusing problems and divisions within the body of Christ. I am simply saying, it's okay to disagree and have conflicts. It's what you do past that point.

Now why did Abram and Lot fight in the first place? Well, look, look at verse 2, "Abram was very rich in livestock and silver and gold." Verse 5, "Lot also, who went with him, had flocks and herds and tents." And verse 6, "The land was not able to support them that they may dwell together for (or because) their possessions were so great that couldn't dwell together." It is interesting that it was their possessions that complicated the friendship. When they didn't have very much, they were free to just roam around without conflict, but now Abram's out of Egypt. He had more than he went in with. And it's those possessions that cause conflict. The greatest test, more than the test of adversity or trial in a person's life, is the test of prosperity. More have fallen under the test of prosperity than have fallen under the test of adversity and suffering. Now very few people can handle true prosperity. The greed and the jealousy often just- it's hard to keep that out. I want you to notice something else, uh, there's an added pressure here. We looked at it in verse 7. It says, "The Canaanites and the Perquisites then dwelt in the land." Okay? Picture it. Lot, Abram, in the land having a conflict and the Canaanites, the Perquisites are checking them out. The enemies of God were watching the children of God to see how they get along. You and I live in a fish bowl, do we not, whether you like it or not, you say, "Hey, I'm a Christian," you're in fish bowl. You just bought yourself a ticket to be watched. And you are watched by your family, you are watched by your coworkers, and you are watched by the media. And they want to see how Christians can resolve conflicts, because there's an important scripture that even many worldly people know. Jesus said, "By this shall all men know that you are my disciples by the love you have one for another." Not by the love you have for the whole world. "They'll you're my disciples because you love each other." That'll the be the key. That'll be the little calling card. And so it is distressful, is it not, when you read an article like I have in my library from a couple years ago when the scams were going on. And it said, in the caption it said, "People who love." It was a slam. And it said, "This guy says he loves this guy and this guy says oh how they love this guy, but they're taking each other to court and slamming each other like crazy. The Canaanites and the Perizzites are all around us folks. They're checking us out. And the pressure is on for the church, but the church is in conflict. It's okay to have conflict, work past the point of pain, because you've got an audience. And that’s why we outta get along. It's one of the reasons. Why, young successful yuppy, should you get along with that non-conformist sitting next you in the pew? Why should you get along with the Baptist and the Presbyterian down the street and the Catholics? Because you've got an audience. They're checking you out. You're in the fishbowl.

There's something else I want to draw your attention to. Verse 7 again, look at it a little more closely this time. "There was strife between the herdsmen of Abram and the herdsmen of Lot's livestock." That's important. At this point there is no conflict between Lot and Abram. The conflict is between the herdsmen and the shepherds. People watching the flocks. They're not getting along. Lot and Abram still love each other. Possessions have complicated their lives a little bit but there's no indication that they're not getting along. The strife is between the under shepherds and there's a little insight here, the reason I'm camping on that verse. There's a little insight here into getting along with people inside the body of Christ and friendships. Oftentimes there is not strife between two people. The strife comes when little groups of people who along with one or the other are not getting along and defending one another and polarizing into little teams. Team A and Team B. And they start fighting it out. When the leaders in charge or the two friends really aren't having that big of a problem with each other. It's the people who are talking behind the scenes who are generating the strife. It's the herdsmen who are creating a lot of the problem. And this happens not only with friends, like Abram and Lot, it happens with churches, doesn't it? What did Paul say in Corinthians? He said, "Why is it when I come and I hear that there's one that says 'I'm a Paul. I'm of a Apollos, I'm of Cephas, I'm of Christ." He says, "Why are you dividing into these little groups and polarizing under the names and personalities of these groups of people? You're creating a division in the body of Christ between yourselves." Now Paul doesn't have a problem with Peter. And Peter doesn't have a problem with Apollos. And none of them have a problem with Christ. But you're making them divided because you're polarizing and you are emphasizing the messenger above the message. And that's where problems are created. It is natural for human beings to identify with leaders. It is natural for you to turn on the radio or the TV and hear somebody or see somebody you like and say, "That guy's right on." But then, as it often happens, we judge everybody else by how much they like this person and if they like it as much as we do, then they're our friends and if they don't then they're our enemies. And it happens between churches where groups in churches will fight and yet the leaders of those churches in the same town, they can hang out together. They don't have a big problem. And so we need to be careful, to emphasize the message of the Gospel, not the messenger.

Let's go on. There's a solution. Verse 8. Abram offers it. "Abram said to Lot, "Please let there be no strife between you and me, and between my herdsmen and your herdsmen; because we're brothers." There's another key. We can't go on until we see it. The beginning of this verse. There's a conflict, there's a strife. Now they need to work past the point of pain, right? Abram could go up to Lot and say, "You know what? You're a jerk. You're creating conflict with my herdsmen. Take up your stuff and split." No, they were willing to work past the point of pain. And here's my point: Abram took the initiative. You know, somebody's got to take the initiative. Abram took the initiative. Abram got out there and made an appeal. "Please, let's not fight this thing out. We're brothers. Let's get along." Abram took the first move. Meaningful friendships, folks, are not easy. It's not a piece of cake. But you stick it out in a meaningful relationship. It takes a conscious effort to keep lines of communication open, to make the first move, to say, "I'm sorry," even if you're really not quite sure why the other people is bummed out at you. "How can I make it right? Let's keep the lines of communication open." Now, I also realize that to say, "Keep the communication open," sounds like a cliché. But it is vital in maintaining a meaningful relationship with anybody- husband, wife, child, parent, friend and friend. Keep the lines of communication open. One person put it this way, "Together we stick. Divided we're stuck." And Abram knew that. And he was willing to go to Lot and just bare out his heart, show his intentions. "Look I have nothing against you. Let's make this thing right." It is impossible to build friendships when we are building up walls that separate us. We need to be willing to push those bricks out, get out of those walls and face off. And even if the communication is painful, do it. What does Proverbs tell us? It says, "Open rebuke is better than secret love." Better if someone will open up those lines of communication and bare their heart with you than harbor something. Open rebuke is better than hidden love. Now look at Abram's practical solution. Verse 9, "Is not the whole land before you? Please separate from me. If you take the left, then I will go to the right; or, if you go to the right, then I will go to the left." And Lot lifted his eyes and saw all the plain of Jordan, it was well watered everywhere (before the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah) like the garden of the Lord, like the land of Egypt as you go down toward Zoar. Then Lot chose for himself all the plain of Jordan, and Lot journeyed east. And they separated from one another." What a great guy Abram was. Here's Lot, being blessed by God because of Uncle Abram. And yet Abram is willing to relinquish his rights. He is willing to let Lot make his own choice that could leave Abram with the wrong end of the stick. And yet because he loves Lot, he wants unity and he wants to be a good witness, he doesn't care about his material possession. He says, "Look, whatever is the best, take the best. Doesn't matter that I have it. If you want it, I'll just take whatever is left over." Even though God made Abram a promise. Uh, keep your finger here and flip over to Philippians Chapter two for just a moment. Look at Philippians. What Abraham did is described in principle in Philippians Chapter 2. It says in verse 3, "Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind, let each esteem others better than himself." the Williams translation says, "Let each one practice treating one another as their superior." That's difficult. How do you do it? Verse 4: "Let each of you look not on his own or not only on his own interest but also for the interests of others." "Don't be concerned about your own little world," he says, "and your own little agenda, but really be concerned about the other person." Do you know why people aggravate us? People aggravate us because we don't get our way with them. They're not seeing things like we see them- the right way. "Now, I know not everybody can be right like me, but if they'd only open up and see this." If I go through life just concerned about myself and you go through life just concerned about yourself, we're going to butt heads. There's going to be a collision. There's going to definitely be conflict. And so the key is esteeming others better than ourselves. A willingness to be second-place. Abram, it's your land. God gave it to you. Why are you giving it to Lot? Because Abram is willing to take second-place.

Leonard Bernstein, one of my favorite little illustrations, great orchestra conductor, said, uh, was asked one time, "What is the hardest place in your orchestra to fill?" He said, "Second fiddle." it's always hard to get people to take the backseat. Now, back to Chapter 13. There's more to this. If you look over to Chapter 14 and verse 14, uh, let me draw the picture. In Chapter 14, a war has broken out, the very first time in scripture that was breaks out, it's in Chapter 14. Lot is taken away. He's been vandalized. They take his family, his goods, and they take him to a new land and a messenger runs up to Abram and goes, "Abram, your Lot nephew has been taken captive by the enemies." And so, verse 14 of Chapter 14 says, "Abram heard that his brother was taken captive. He armed 318 trained servants who were born in his own house, and he went and pursued as far as Dan the north. He divided his forces against them by night, and he and his servants attacked them and pursued them as far as Hobah, which is in the north of Damascus. And so he brought back all of the goods, and also brought back his brother Lot and his goods, as well as the women and the people." I don't know why there is a distinction between those two groups, I just read it. He brought him back. Point is, Abram went the second mile. He could've said, "Look, we've had a conflict man. He made his own choice, he's going to have to live with it. If he gets taken into bondage. I gave him the best part of the land." No, he was a friend through thick and thin. My friend Lot is in captivity, he's in bondage. I'm going to go rescue him. He did more than more than many friends would do. He went the second mile. Oh and how many Christians who have been in bondage have been rescued by other believers who will dare to pray and pursue that person. Friends do that. Christians do that. Abram did it. And the Lord said to Abram, after Lot had separated from him: "Lift your eyes now and look from the place where you are—northward, southward, eastward, and westward; for all the land which you see I give to you and to your descendants forever." I want you to compare that with verse 10. Look at verse 10. "Lot lifted up his eyes and saw the plain of Jordan." Verse 11, "Lot chose for himself all the plain of Jordan." Verse 14, "The Lord said to Abram, 'Lift up your eyes. All that you see I'm going to give to you." Verse 16, "And I will make your descendants as the dust of the earth; so that if a man could number the dust of the earth, then your descendants also could be numbered. Get up, arise, walk in the land through its length, its width, for I give it to you." And then Abram moved the tent, and went and dwelt by the terebinth trees of Mamre, which are in Hebron, and built an altar there to the Lord." It's as if God is saying, "You didn't give up a thing. You gave up something but I'm giving you so much more." You could never out-give God.

I want to close with this story that I found.

One stormy night many years ago, an elderly man and his wife entered the lobby of a small hotel in Philadelphia, of all places. The man helps his wife into a chair and then he went to the desk.
"All the big hotels in town are filled. Could you please give us a room here?"
The clerk explained that there were three conventions in town and no rooms were to be had anywhere. "All of our rooms are filled too," he said. "Still, I can’t send a nice couple like you out into the rain at one o’clock in the morning. Would you perhaps be willing to sleep in my room?"
The man replied that he couldn't put the clerk out of his own room, but the clerk insisted,
"Don’t worry about me, I’ll make out just fine."

The next morning as he paid the bill, the elderly man said to the clerk, "You are the kind of person who should be the boss of the best hotel in the country. Maybe someday I’ll build one for you."
The clerk looked at the man and his wife and smiled. The three of them had a good laugh over the man's joke. The clerk helped them with their bags to the street.
Two years passed and the clerk had forgotten the incident when he received a letter from the elderly man. It recalled the night of the storm and enclosed a round-trip ticket to New York.
When the clerk reached New York the man led him to the corner of Fifth Avenue and 34th Street and pointed to a great new building there, a palace of red stone, with turrets and watchtowers like a fairyland castle thrusting up into the sky.
"That," said the older man, "is the hotel I have built for you to manage."
"You must be joking." – the young man said, not quite knowing whether to believe it or not.
"I most assuredly am not joking" – the older man said with a sly smile.
"Just who are you?"
"My name is William Waldorf-Aster. We are naming the hotel the Waldorf-Astoria and you are to be its manager.

Abram gave his room to Lot. God gave him a whole hotel. And perhaps that is one of the greatest things about relationships in the Body of Christ is that because we are connected to Christ, no matter how self-sacrificing we are for other people, God covers us. God is there to give us so much back because he is a friend who sticks closer than a brother. Let's pray.

Lord, we live in a crucial time when friendships, meaningful relationships exist less and less because many of us are willing to give sacrificially less and less. Our prayer this morning, Lord, is that we would be those who pursue friendships. We decide to develop relationships in this body where we demand absolutely nothing in return. That sounds hard, but when we know the rewards that You have for us, it makes it not all that tough. Help us keep that perspective Lord as we reach out and build within this church meaningful, wonderful, warm, intimate relationships as we're connected to You. In Jesus name, Amen.

Additional Messages in this Series

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1/8/1989
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Ladies and Gentleman…Meet Abraham
Genesis 11:27-12:9
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1/15/1989
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Have I Got Plans for You
Genesis 12:1-3
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1/22/1989
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Steps of Unfaith
Genesis 12:10-20
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2/12/1989
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God Helps Those Who Help Themselves?
Genesis 16:1-6
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2/19/1989
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Guess Who's Coming To Dinner
Genesis 18:1-15
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2/26/1989
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God…Can We Talk?
Genesis 18:16-33
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3/5/1989
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God's Perfect Will in an Imperfect World
Genesis 21:1-21
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3/12/1989
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The Suffering of Sacrifice
Genesis 22
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3/19/1989
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Death at the Doorstep
Genesis 23
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There are 9 additional messages in this series.
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