This
Is a Very Good Deal, Let's Close it!!!
Gen 17: 1-14 NIV
Purpose: After
the listening to the sermon, we will be able to trust in the deals that God commands
us to make with Him.
17 When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the Lord appeared to him and said, “I am God Almighty; walk before me faithfully and be blameless. 2 Then I will make my covenant between me and you and will greatly increase your numbers.”
3 Abram fell
facedown, and God said to him,
4 “As for me, this is my covenant with
you: You will be the father of many nations.
5 No longer
will you be called Abram; your name will be Abraham, for I have made you a
father of many nations.
6 I will make
you very fruitful; I will make nations of you, and kings will come from you.
7 I will establish my covenant as an
everlasting covenant between me and you and your descendants after you for the
generations to come, to be your God and the God of your descendants after you.
8 The whole land of Canaan
9 Then God
said to Abraham, “As for you, you must keep my covenant, you and your
descendants after you for the generations to come.
10 This is my
covenant with you and your descendants after you, the covenant you are to keep:
Every male among you shall be circumcised.
11 You are to
undergo circumcision, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and
you.
12 For the
generations to come every male among you who is eight days old must be
circumcised, including those born in your household or bought with money from a
foreigner—those who are not your offspring.
13 Whether
born in your household or bought with your money, they must be circumcised. My
covenant in your flesh is to be an everlasting covenant.
14 Any
uncircumcised male, who has not been circumcised in the flesh, will be cut off
from his people; he has broken my covenant.”
This is the Word of God,
For the people of God.
Praise be to God, amen.
This
Is a Very Good Deal, Let's Close it!!!
Gen 17: 1-14 NIV
Purpose: After
the listening to the sermon, we will be able to trust in the deals that God commands
us to make with Him.
Outline
I. Introduction
II. Business
in the world vs. Business with God
III. Explanation
of the biblical text
IV. Conclusion[s]
V. Prayer
This
Is a Very Good Deal, Let's Close it!!!
Gen 17: 1-14 NIV
Purpose: After
the listening to the sermon, we will be able to trust in the deals that God commands
us to make with Him.
Are you
familiar with the Forbes magazine??? I am asking you, because I was not. Let me
tell you that it is a good, a very good magazine for several reasons. First,
this magazine connects people, companies, and places. One of the focus of this
magazine is to talk about the wealthiest people in America America
Obviously,
they are very smart people because they know when to close a good deal.
Zuckerberg has created a unique form of massive communication that has been
attractive to millions of people in the world. And, do you know why Facebook
has been attractive to the world??? Because Facebook has covered a need. People
wanted to contact people who had lost communication with them for years or
where distant was an issue. Facebook just beat the barrier of time. That is,
when we used to write letters to our family or friends or when we used to make
long distant phone calls. Now, it is easier and practical to go to our smart
phone or our tablet and connect in Facebook and in minutes we can contact
whoever we want, even if this person is on the other side of the world.
Another very
important thing that these extraordinary geniuses of the business world have
understood is, that in order to increase their numbers, they know that they cannot work alone. They have to work
with a team. The research team. The marketing team. The customer service team.
The quality team. The investors team, etc. People in the business world know
that when comes to work the I
becomes We. One clear example of
this is, Mark Zuckerberg. He started
developing his ideas since he was a little boy in middle school. However, it
was not until he was in his university years when he developed Facebook. In his
junior years he got the help of his dad, who employed an instructor in computer
programming to help his son to obtain more knowledge in how to create communication
tools and computer games. In his Harvard years, he and his partner needed more
computer programmers, after that, he and his partners reached for more money
through the strategy of investors, it was when Facebook opened to everybody.[2]
Besides the
understanding that their I or their me became we as a team, they changed their
lives, because the passed from the student's life to the billionaire's world.
The changing of their lives has been evident in their way to live their
everyday lives.
Actually, in
the biblical narrative of today, God was looking for people who can close a big
and very big deal with Him. As always, God took the first step and He
encountered Abram. God was commanding Abram to become a partner with Him in the
business of His Kingdom. God promised Abram great profits. He was going to get
such profits that he was not going to be able to count them because they were
going to become nations or as numerous as the stars on the sky. God always
works as a team with humans.
It is very important
to notice that in order to be in business with God, God requires a contract or
a covenant with His people. This covenant is NOT because God has to be
remaindered that He has to be loyal and faithful to the points that are part of
the agreement. This covenant is for us to remember in what business we have
entered with God. After we have closed the deal with Him, then we are going to
experience a radical transformation. It is impossible to know God and not
change. It doesn't exist. We cannot be the same after we experience serious
business with God because He is an active god.
In fact, do
you remember the last week that we talked of how God changed the name of Jacob
for Israel Egypt Egypt
We have to
noticed that also the one last important thing that God had required from
Abraham was to have a visual sign of the deal that they just closed. It was a
kind of signature that they had closed a very good deal. God told Abraham to
circumcised all the males. Whoever was not circumcised was going to be cut off
from the people because he was not in the contract with God.
My dear ones,
nowadays, we also have our visible signature which tells the rest of this
fallen world that we have closed a very good deal with God. We have Jesus
Christ in our hearts and minds. He has changed us and this change has been in a
very radical way. We have passed from flirting with sin to committed sons and
daughter of God. We have a very real and evident mark of our agreement with God
when we tell other what Jesus has done for us. We show our mark when through
our every day conversations with people because we are authentic people of
hope. And, mainly through our every day behavior and actions in the form of
Christ likeness.
Our challenge for today is a challenge that
needs to be the main focus for the rest of our lives, is to go to the world and
make as much profit as possible for God, growing His business that is the
Kingdom.
Let us pray,
Dear and Good
Father,
Thank You so
much for the high profit deal that You have closed with us. We have became
billionaires. Help us to be very good investors and multiply Your profits in
the only way that You wants us to do it. Spreading the Good News of the Gospel
in this fallen world. In Jesus' name, we pray. Amen!!!
[1] http://search.tb.ask.com/search/GGmain.jhtml?p2=^BNF^xdm007^YYA^us&ptb=CAF42549-F39F-41FF-97C7-46048218B6A9&ind=2015081216&n=781bb300&st=bar&searchfor=what+is+the+focus+of+Forbes+magazine%3f
(Accessed on October 1, 2015).
[2] http://astrumpeople.com/mark-zuckerberg-biography-success-story-of-facebook-founder-and-ceo/
(Accessed on October 1, 2015).
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