Sermon Tone Analysis

In January of 2020, I started preaching through Genesis.

My plan was to break it up and preach Genesis in a few different chunks—Genesis 1-11, 12-25, 26-50.

So that’s what I started to do.

I preached Genesis 1-11 during January, February, and March of 2020.

And, right as I was preaching the last message in Genesis 11, the world came to a screeching halt thanks to Covid-19.

I’m assuming with everything that’s happened over the last three years, most of us don’t remember much from any of those sermons in Genesis.

That’s just fine; I don’t expect you to remember.

Just take my word for it: we covered Genesis 1-11 in eleven (11) sermons during the first three months of 2020.

I went back and looked at the manuscript of the first sermon I preached from my living room during the Covid lock-down.

It was the last sermon in Genesis 11 and it was oddly, though not surprisingly, providential.

You see, I pick a book of the Bible and preach through it in full or in part, a section at a time.

I tend to bounce back-and-forth between OT and NT, so that we get a balanced diet of Bible.

So then, March 2020, at the height of the chaos and the fear, the Lord was using His Word—the very passage I had planned to preach 6-7 months prior—to speak to this small part of His local church (and the 800 or so who watched on Facebook).

The point of the passage (Gen 11:10-32) I preached to Facebook via my wife’s phone that morning was this: “The world is confused, but God is not.”

That’s the point of the passage in Genesis—God had just confused the languages of the people at the Tower of Babel.

The world was confused in Genesis 11, and that was just exactly the state of the world in March of 2020.

We were terribly confused and unsure of what exactly was going on; but God was not.

The world may be confused, but God is not.

In Genesis 11, we have Babel, the 3rd major event in Genesis, followed by the 3rd genealogy.

Track this with me.

In Genesis 1-2, we have creation.

Genesis 3-4, the fall and the immediate effects of sin.

Then Genesis 5, we read the first genealogy in the book.

In Genesis 6-9 we read about the corruption of man and the flood, Noah’s ark.

And then in Genesis 10, the second genealogy.

Now, Genesis 11, we come to the Tower of Babel—the self-focused and sinful behavior of the people.

God scatters mankind, and, guess what?

Another genealogy.

Creation-fall-genealogy.

Corruption-flood-genealogy.

Self-obsession-tower-genealogy.

A pattern clearly emerges.

Mankind keeps sinning, falling, find themselves confused.

And God keeps on going, working out His plan and purpose without interruption.

After each major event—the Fall, the Flood, the Tower—the world is out of sorts.

After Babel, the world is scattered and confused.

And onward goes God.

The message of Genesis is that God is working out His plan and purpose without interruption, without fail.

As we pick up the story in Genesis 12, we will meet a fellow named Abram.

He was mentioned in the genealogy in Genesis 11.

You probably know him as “Abraham,” but that extra syllable comes a little bit later.

If you have your Bible (and I hope you do) please turn with me to the book of Genesis.

If you are able and willing, please stand for the reading of God’s Holy Word:

May God add His blessing to the reading of His Holy Word!

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The history of redemption, like that of creation, begins with God speaking.

So this section of Genesis begins with God speaking.

“The Lord had said to Abram…”

This call is utterly unexplainable.

This is how the chapter begins— “The Lord said to Abram…” — these are some difficult words to explain.

We can’t explain them historically.

We know that since this is Genesis 12, Genesis 1-11 come before this chapter.

But all we find in those chapters, really, are the fall, the flood, and the tower of Babel.

The picture in Genesis 1-11 is a world which is content—pleased, even—to do without the Lord and His rule.

As a result, the world was therefore cursed, destroyed, and, most recently, scattered.

Whey does the LORD Yahweh, the One True God, give this world that mocks and defies and rejects Him the promise of blessing (the root word for bless appears 5 times in verses 2-3 alone)?

God insists on blessing this world—all the people on earth—with Abram as the channel of blessing.

God will start all over again with one man as the funnel of redemption.

But why?

Well, because God has in mind the end history as depicted in Revelation 7.

Rev 7:9 “…a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and before the Lamb…”

We know well the history of the people of God down throughout the ages.

How they stumble and fall and rebel and worship other gods.

We know even better our own propensity toward sin and rebellion and rejection of God.

And yet God seems to insist on blessing us and loving us and working on us?

Why?

I can’t explain it anymore than I can explain God’s call of Abram here.

It makes no sense, historically or personally.

We sing songs about Abram (well, more accurately Abraham, but still).

We speak about him with respect and warmth, like a favorite uncle or Jimmy Stewart—a guy you can’t help liking; you know, one of the good guys.

A good ol’ boy.

But this isn’t the Bible’s view of Abram (especially not at this point in the story).

A few books into the Bible, Joshua repeats the Lord’s words to Israel:

That was Abram.

Why did God call Abram the sinner, Abram the pagan, Abram the idol worshipper?

It defies logic.

It doesn’t make any sense.

It’s unexplainable.

And here, friends, is the truth: the call of God is no different where you are concerned.

If you think you know why God has shown His grace to you or have a few reasons why He would/should, then you don’t know yourself at all, and you haven’t the foggiest idea what grace is.

It’s undeserved.

Un-caused.

Unprompted.

There’s nothing in you to account for God’s choice of you.

Nothing at all.

1 Cor 1:27-28 “But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong.

God chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are,”

There’s no explaining Abram’s call or ours.

You can’t explain why there’s a call at all, why the gracious God would show grace to you at all.

God’s call of Abram is gracious and effective.

The first few words of verse 4 show us.

Simply stated: “So Abram went, as the LORD had told him…”

This is a big deal.

A major undertaking.

Any woman who’s packed the car for a week’s vacation knows how unbelievably difficult this is.

Anyone who’s moved cross country knows the struggle.

But here, in Genesis 12, there’s no report of the route, nothing about trouble they might face on the way; nothing mentioned about what they encountered on the journey, the price of gas, the availability of Chick-fil-A or decent coffee along the road.

There’s none of that.

Simply Abram went as the Lord had told him, in spite of family ties in Harran, or Abram’s age, or any uncertainty about his destination.

The LORD Yahweh had spoken to him, and Abram obeyed.

Beyond obedience, Abram worships the LORD.