GOD MAKES AND CUTS HIS "DEALS."
GOD MAKES AND CUTS HIS ‘DEALS,”
Sunday, August 18, 2024
Pastor Carolyn Sissom
When I awoke Saturday morning, I heard, “It is God who makes and cuts His deals.”
We do not make deals with God.
Making a “deal” is colloquialism in American English for sealing an agreement or transaction between one or more people. Between God and man, it is God alone who initiates the “deal” or “covenant” and then if man is obedient, he will come into agreement with God’s “deal,” and receive God’s blessing which He is releasing to earth.
I have been blessed to have the Lord God initiate deals/covenants with me on multiple occasions. All have to do with His Kingdom purposes, not fleshly or soulical lusts. I have shared the testimonies of some of these visitations in other sermons. Today I want to release the faith of Abraham to our congregation as well as our nation as we are faced with a nation being threatened from within and without.
Last week in the message on Deliverance From the Spirit of Poverty, I used the example of the first offerings mentioned in the bible by Cain and Able. God blessed Able’s offering, but Cain was thereafter under a curse and banished to the land of Nod.
Today, moving forward to the next mention of offerings which were blessed by the Lord, we come to Abraham. Abraham’s spiritual journey with he LORD is written in Genesis chapters 12-22. He received five deals/covenants initiated by the LORD.
Genesis 12:1-7, recalls Abraham’s call and the scope of the divine blessing. Abraham arrived in the Land of Promise and was immediately faced with a problem – The “Canaanites were in the land.” The Canaanites were a cruel, corrupt, immoral, callous, and unclean people. The Lord appeared to Abraham and said, “To your offspring I will give this land; so he built there an altar to the Lord, who had appeared to him (12:7). Abraham offered up an altar of praise (sacrifice of praise).
Acts.3:25: You are heirs of the prophets and of the covenant God made with your fathers. He said to Abraham, ‘Through your offspring all peoples on earth will be blessed.’
This deal/covenant was not Abraham’s idea, but it was God’s idea and God initiated and made His deal with Abraham which would ultimately bless the entire earth.
Abraham made seven critical decisions in his lifetime. The LORD required of Him seven separations: 1. Country; 2. Kindred; 3. Egypt; 4. Lot; 5. A desire to get wealth 6. Ishmael; 7: Isaac. This reveals a pattern of the faith-walk of every believer. The desire to get wealth is most critical. God does no bestow an unlimited provision upon those who lust after money (1 Tim 6:10). The Man of Faith cannot be bought. After the 7th separation from Isaac, the promise, in Gen. 22, God revealed Himself to Abraham as Jehovah-Jireh (Jehovah will provide). There is a complete, unlimited provision without any further requirements. God made Abraham’s name great. He was very wealthy. All was initiated by the Lord for the Lord’s eternal purposes. I will make nations of you and kings will come out of you. I will bless your seed with great material substance. I will make an eternal covenant with you.
According to Hebrews 11:8-16, Abraham found this great favor with God by faith, obedience, and trusting God even with the promise. Are we holding onto a promise from God that we have not been willing to place on an altar of worship. I judge myself by what I preach.
11:8-19: By faith Abraham…obeyed… By faith he sojourned… for he looked for a city which has foundations whose builder and maker is God. Through faith, Sara received strength to conceive… These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them… By faith Abraham offered up Isaac… of whom it was said that in Isaac shall your seed be called. Accounting that God was able to raise him up, even from the dead…
Gen. 15:6: Abraham believed in the LORD, and he counted it to him for righteousness.
So, we the church in the year 2024, are being called upon to release that same faith not only for God’s covenant promises over the Untied States, but God’s covenant promises over the land of Israel. The Seed of Abraham is Christ, and heirs according to the promise. Gal. 3:16: “If you are in Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed. But the land is also promised to Abraham.
Gen15:18: In the same day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, Unto your seed have I given this land from the river of Egypt unto the great river, the river Euphrates.
Like Isaac, we have received the blessings of the promises made to Abraham of things to come. By faith Isaac blessed Jacob and Essau concerning things to come. Jesus Christ was made heir of all things and we are joint heirs with Him (Ro. 8:17). For the promise that he should be heir of the world (kosmos), was not to Abraham, or to His Seed through the law, but through the righteousness of faith. (Ro. 4:13; Gal: 3:1-9).
We have received the promises and the inheritance. We, too, must release, decree, and by faith receive all the promises of God and bless our nation, the sheep nations and Israel with these promises. The Christ within us is released by the spoken word.
God makes the “deal.” He has already made the “deal.” We receive the blessings and the promise by faith, obedience, and trusting God.
“Abram, the battle was waged and won before you got into it! The everlasting Covenant was planned from eternity, cut on the cross of Calvary, and ratified by the Resurrection.” (Kelly Varner)
The man of the Spirit is more concerned about the love for his brother, unity, and the witness to the heathen, than he is for his own wealth.
The man of the Spirit knows our provision in famine, financial tribulation, and war is secure in the promise.
Last week I promised to teach on the twelve Scriptural blessings of giving which release to us the promises and blessings of God. I mentioned each one but let us look at the scriptures. These are God’s “deals/covenants already signed in the Blood of Jesus to bless us just as He has blessed the heroes of faith through the ages.
This is God’s deal/covenant to take care of His church during times of tribulation:
1. Into the place of feeding: Mal. 3:10-11: Bring all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be meat in my house; and prove me now herewith, says the LORD OF hosts, if I will not open to you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it. I will rebuke the devourer for your sakes, and he shall not destroy the fruits of your ground; neither shall your vine cast her fruit before the time in the field, says he LORD of hosts.
2. Willingly: Ex. 35:22: And they came, both men and women, as many as were willing hearted; and brought bracelets, and earrings, and rings, and tablets, all jewels of gold; and every man that offered an offering of gold unto the LORD.
3. Regularly: 1 Co. 16:2: Upon the first day of the week let every one of you lay by him in store, as God has prospered him, that there be no gatherings when I come.
4. Personally: 1 Co. 16:2: Let every one of you.
5. Proportionally: 1 Co. 6:2: As God has prospered him.
6. According to income or ability: 2 Co. 8:12: For if there is first a willing mind, it is accepted according to what one has and not according to what he does not have.
7. Freely: Matt. 10:8: heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out demons. Freely you have received, freely give.
8. Cheerfully: 2 Cor. 9:7: So, let each one give as he purposes in his heart, not grudgingly or of necessity, for God loves a cheerful giver.
9. With simplicity – sincerity and generosity; Ro. 12:8: he who exhorts, in exhortation, he who gives, with liberality, he who leads, with diligence, he who shows mercy, with cheerfulness.
10. With Proper Motives: Matt. 6:1-4: Take heed that you do not do your charitable deeds before men, to be seen by them. Otherwise, you have no reward from your Father in heaven. Therefore, when you do a charitable deed, do not sound a trumpet before you as he hypocrites do in the synagogues and in he streets, that they may have glory from men. Assuredly, I say to you, they have their reward.
11. Sacrificially: Lk. 21: 1-4: Jesus saw a certain poor widow putting in two mites. Truly I say to you that this poor widow has put in more than all; for all these out of their abundance have put in offerings for God, but she out of poverty put in all the livelihood that she had.
12. The Open Hand – always ready to bless and minister: Deut. 15: 7-11: If there is among you a poor man of your brethren, within any of the gates in your land which the LORD your God is giving you, you shall not harden your heart nor shut your hand from your poor brother, but you shall open your hand wide to him and willingly lend him sufficient for his need, whatever he needs. Beware lest there be a wicked thought in your heart… and your eye is evil against your brother and you give him nothing, and he cry out to the LORD against you, and it becomes sin among you. You shall surely give to him, and your heart should not be grieved when you give to him, because for this thing the LORD your God will bless you in all your works and in all to which you put your hand. For the poor will never cease from the land; therefore, I command you, saying, “you shall open your hand wide to your brother, to your poor and your needy, in your land.”
Like I wrote above, I have to judge myself by what I preach. There are times when the needs of people bear heavy on me. I ask the LORD Jesus to give me the grace of the open hand please always.
Carolyn Sissom, Pastor
Eastgate Ministries Church, 10115 West Hidden Lakes Lane, Richmond, TX
Scripture fro K.J.V. and N.K.J.V. I entered into the labors of Tabernacle of Moses by Kelly Varner. Comments and conclusions are my own and not meant to reflect the views of Dr. Varner.