HOUSEHOLD OF FAITH LEADING TO THE HOUSEHOLD OF GOD AND HIS SERVICE (1)

HOUSEHOLD OF FAITH LEADING TO THE HOUSEHOLD OF GOD AND HIS SERVICE (1)

Galatians 6: 10; Genesis 14: 14; Genesis 15: 1 - 4; Genesis 21: 8 - 11; Genesis 24: 2 - 4

I thought we might look at the household of faith. It contemplates that faith will be in those in it. The next step to the household of faith is the household of God, and that leads to the assembly.

One feature of the household idea is stewardship. In Genesis 24: 2 Abraham speaks “to his servant, the eldest of his house, who ruled over all that he had”.

Then training in the house is to be noticed. Genesis 14: 14 says: “And Abram heard that his brother was taken captive; and he led out his trained servants, born in his house, three hundred and eighteen”. How ill-trained we are in service and the things of God! The household idea is attractive; it should appeal to all believers. Control is there; training is there; influence is there. In Galatians the household of faith is referred to in addressing lawless christians.

An emergency arises in connection with Lot. A brother is taken north about two hundred miles. How are we going to meet it? You need your whole household to set that brother right, and it is a trained household. The number is three hundred and eighteen, not round numbers; every one is necessary. An untrained person would be in the way. The apostle sent a trained servant to Corinth in the person of Timothy. He had been “shewn” certain things at Corinth; in 1 Corinthians 5 it was a matter of report.

^[p. 2] The first element of training in a house is to be seen in the children. Influence is there in the father and mother. Love and affection must be there too.

Abram’s allies were ‘masters of covenant’ (see J.N.D.’s note b to Genesis 14: 13). Apollos was a good ally, but Timothy was a trained servant.

The “all” of Galatians 6: 10 means all. “So then, as we have occasion, let us do good towards all”. This enlarges us in our outlook. We must not look at the nations as a mass of conglomerate lawlessness; God has them in control.

What is faith? Is it light? It is more than light. Light comes by the eye, faith comes by hearing. Fundamentally faith is a gift. It is more substantive than light. See what marked those in Hebrews 11.

Chapter 15 brings in the thought of the seed, for the household of faith must be “wholly a right seed” (Jeremiah 2: 21). Abram says, “I go childless, and the steward of my house is this Eliezer of Damascus;” as if to say, ‘he is all right, but what is he to me?’ Abram is discriminative; he must have “wholly a right seed” with right antecedents, right father, right mother. A wife must be a sister, not a half-sister. Esau married two of the daughters of the land. Ishmael had a good father but a poor mother. Mongrels are objectionable in the house of God. Look at Rome, Lutherans, Anglicans, Presbyterians, and so on — the mothers are not right and the product cannot be right. The wholly right seed is Christ. Those of the right seed are of faith, and if they have the right mother they will apprehend the assembly.

In verse 9, the heifer comes first, then a she-goat, each mature. It is the feminine side in maturity. It means that Abram must go through things spiritually. He begins the four hundred years of suffering. It must be so, for it cannot be figured out in any other way; actually the children of Israel were in Egypt a little over two hundred years. So now ^[p. 3] Abram begins to feel things — the birds of prey come down on the carcases. These represent the powers of Satan. Then the horror of great darkness suggests that Christ entered into everything on the cross.