By Brandon Lemons
I enjoy reading and learning. A wide variety of topics pique my interest, including sports, investing, exploration and adventure, biographies, history, and ministry-related themes. I particularly value books that offer significant “explanatory power.” By this, I mean a book that provides an explanation for why things are the way they are, or how something came to be a certain way. When we understand how things got to be the way they are, it opens our minds to new depth and insight, even as we are going about our daily lives and interpreting what is happening around us.
For the next eleven weeks, we will dive into a sermon series that offers significant “explanatory power” when it comes to understanding the Bible and the Gospel. The series is about the life and legacy of Abraham. It is difficult to overstate the influence of Abraham throughout the rest of Scripture. The account of his life encompasses fifteen chapters in Genesis, and references to him, and effects of his life, reverberate throughout the Old Testament.
Abraham continues to be a major figure in the New Testament. Matthew traces Jesus’ genealogy back to Abraham (Matt. 1:17). Faithful Jews were called “sons” and “daughters” of Abraham (Luke 13:16; 19:9). Jesus referenced Abraham many times, including saying that Abraham looked forward to Jesus’ day (John 8:56). Paul and James feature Abraham as a supreme example of true faith (Rom. 4; Gal. 3; James 2:21).
The more robust our understanding of Abraham, the more the entire biblical storyline, and the Gospel itself, will make sense and come alive in our minds and in our lives!
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