God is always looking for serious people

Come with me to Genesis chapter 28, verses 18-22, a moment in the life of the patriarch Jacob. At the beginning of the year we were talking about Bethel, the place where God originally appeared to Abraham, then he appeared to Jacob as well, and throughout the Bible we see that Bethel, "House of God" in Spanish, played an important role in the lives of the patriarchs, and also has a symbolic purpose in our lives.

It is the place where covenants are established, it is the place where covenants are renewed, it is the place of personal encounters with God. It is the place where God speaks to men like Jacob and Abraham about His purposes and promises to bless them, and calls them to make a firm commitment to Him. It is a sacred and holy place.

And there Jacob found himself, in that mysterious place, one night when he was fleeing from his brother Esau who wanted to kill him because Jacob had stolen his birthright, Esau who was a weak and unstable man who did not appreciate the privilege that he had as an older brother, As the firstborn to bear his family's inheritance, the spiritual inheritance as the father of his family, Esau did not appreciate that privilege that he had and traded it for a plate of food when he was hungry and returned from a day of hunting. Jacob appreciated and wanted such spiritual leadership.

And he used a not very legitimate, not very good means to appropriate the birthright and in a sense he trapped his brother Esau so that his brother would make a deal with him and give him the birthright, he disguised himself and seduced him in a sense to give it to him. And when Esau woke up, and realized what had happened and what he had lost, and found that his brother had deceived him in this way, he wanted to kill him and Jacob had to flee from home and take refuge in another land with his mother's family.

And on the way he stopped in this place or God stopped him there, because it is a mysterious place, it is a place where in some way God was present there, and God appeared to him and spoke to him, and then we take here the story in the Verse 18 says: "And Jacob got up early in the morning, and took the stone that he had placed as his headboard" as he was sleeping outdoors, he did not have a pillow, so he took a stone and lay down on the stone; I imagine the neck pain he had the next day.

But nonetheless: "He took the stone which he had placed at the head and set it up as a sign, and poured oil on top of it." How beautiful are the rituals, how beautiful are the symbols. God's people have sometimes learned the meaning of the importance of symbols. We evangelicals are sometimes very dry in the way we worship the Lord. I love them and every day I gain more appreciation for symbolic acts and things that are symbolic for dealings and things we do with God.

And he picked up that stone, I imagine that in a sense he would have been sleeping on that stone, like maybe his intimacy had been there all night on that stone, God appeared to him in a kind of dream. And he took that stone and poured oil as a sign of consecration, as if to separate this stone, to make this stone no longer something inert, dead there, senseless, and by pouring oil he consecrated it and gave it spiritual life, and constituted it as in a signal, a flag. It was like a way of signing him and pointing out the sacredness of what he was going to do at that moment.

How important it is, brothers, when we make a commitment to God that we take a moment to seal it, become aware of what we are doing. Do not do things lightly, do not be careless, be sober and solemn in the things we do, and remember, mark them. That is why it is so important.

People say, well, I don't have to come forward to receive Christ as my Lord and Savior, that's true, you don't have to. But the truth is that great gestures need something to remember them, something that marks the energy that one is investing in it, because otherwise one easily forgets them. That is why when people are going to get married they invite their friends, they invite the Pastor, they have a ceremony and they do it before witnesses, and sometimes they even publish things in the newspapers, and they have a big party to testify, and to remember what It has been done; so that the whole community knows: we are committing ourselves and they themselves also mark the importance of what they are doing. God likes those things. God has not changed his way of being, he likes to mark the agreements he makes with us.

So he poured oil on top of the stone and even gave that place a name, and the name of that place he says is, he called it Bethel, although previously Luz was the name of that city, first of all. Then verse 20 says that: "Jacob made a vow" a vow means a promise, a weighty spiritual agreement, "saying: if God were with me and saved me on this journey that I am going, and gave me bread to eat and clothing to put on, and if I return in peace to my father's house" look, here is what, this is the pact that he makes: "Jehovah will be my God."

By saying this he was pointing out something, it is that he moved in an idolatrous context where there were many different gods, the same God that he adored, Jehovah was not well known. What's more, I believe that Jacob himself did not understand very well who Jehovah was because Jehovah had barely appeared to his grandfather, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and God had not yet been explored so to speak or revealed in the detail that It would have to be revealed gradually. Jacob has an instinctive understanding of God at this point.

But he says: you know what? If God accompanies me, goes with me, gets me out of this mess I'm in right now, I'm going to make Him my God. I am going to live my life in relationship with Him, with His commandments, with His universe, His world, His realm. "The Lord will be my God, and this stone that I have set as a sign will be the house of God. And of all that you give me, I will set aside a tithe for You."

How interesting that is, later I can speak perhaps if a moment comes to my mind, as the final sign of all his commitment was that "and from everything you give me, I will set aside a tithe for you." There was also a mentality, a thought, a way of seeing God and His authority, and other things.

But what I want to talk to you about this morning, brothers, I want you to mark this in your heart, is a God of pacts, a God of pacts. And I am going to tell you the initial thought that served as the basis for me, to choose this topic for our message this morning, and if I do not achieve anything else, leave with this thought. And it is that, God likes people who make pacts with Him. God likes people who take him seriously and who take themselves seriously, and themselves, and who come before God with all seriousness and all intentionality, and all deliberation, and makes a firm deal, and a commitment to Him, and they don't look back, and follow Him no matter what. God likes to deal with people like that, serious people, people of integrity, people of their word, and that is what I want you to take with you.

Because what I read inside when I thought about it was that God is always looking for serious people, people who take Him seriously, people who consider well what they are doing when they approach Him, and who are people of a single word, and who do not look back when they make a commitment to the Lord. These people want to bless and with these people God wants to deal, and with these people God is committed, and fights for them, and blesses them.

And those kinds of people who make serious pacts with God, who sign those pacts with the seriousness with which Jacob did. When he was pouring that oil on that stone he was saying: There is no going back. Today I make a pact with the Lord and this is going to be my pact, I am going to serve it all the days of my life.

Why do I say that too? Because I believe that, brothers, in the evangelical world there are many people, and in all of Christianity, there are many double-minded people. There are many people who do not understand the seriousness of what it is to walk in the ways of the Lord. Many people who come to Church but do not have a personal sense of what they are moving into, what universe they have entered, the seriousness of serving God, the importance of being whole with the Lord and being wary of the Holiness and magnificence of God, who take God seriously.

I believe that by preaching, with propriety in fact, about the God of grace and mercy, and of love who sympathizes and compassionates us, and who is a God who treats us as children, all of this is very important, we have Sometimes, by not emphasizing the other side of the matter, the side of the holiness of God, of His magnificence, of His royalty and how we have to serve Him with tremendous meticulousness and tremendous care, we have lost a lot in the world. evangelical.

And there are many people today who then view God in a very relaxed way, and they take all kinds of liberties with God, not knowing that God has never changed his ways. God takes Himself very seriously and He is very aware of His Holiness, of His magnificence, of His greatness and He really likes that they take Him seriously, and that they don't mess with Him, and He likes those people. who is always knowing that everything they live, everything they do, everything they speak, everything they think is unfolded before the eyes of God whenever they see everything, and they walk with that sense that God right now is being witness what I am doing, saying, thinking and walk with that awareness, they always want to please God in everything and are always seeking the glory of God.

I've been thinking about these days and actually shared it with the pastoral staff of the Church this week from a verse in Jeremiah, I think it's the 9th chapter of Jeremiah, where it says, "Let not the wise boast of his wisdom, nor let the valiant man praise himself in his valor, nor the rich man say the Lord in his wealth. for these things I want, says the Lord."

Look how seriously God takes himself. He says: Look, if someone has to praise themselves, people praise themselves for being rich, for being brave, for being wise, but you know what? that's rubbish. If someone has to praise themselves, no one should praise themselves, He frankly says, but if you cannot refrain from praising yourself, praise yourselves for this: for understanding and knowing me, because that is what truly counts, look who says it, God himself says it. In other words God takes Himself seriously, so seriously.

God is not modest in the sense that he kind of tries to hide His glory, right? God is just exactly how he has to be. There is nothing greater than Him and He can very well tell people: Look, the most important thing is that you understand Me and know Me. In other words: look how seriously God takes himself.

And so we have to take Him seriously, and that is why we have to walk before the Lord with great fear and in a very picky way. And that is why I believe that we, each one, has to come the day, if you have not done it I ask you please, we all have to make a firm pact with God that: Lord, at this moment I commit myself With you rain, shine or wind, I am going to serve you, I am going to walk with you, I am going to obey you, I am going to be extremely careful of Your Glory and Your attributes. And when God sees a person like that, God always falls in love with that person and is committed to that person rain, shine or shine, no matter what, the person who loves the Lord and who is steadfast with the Lord.

And I'm not saying this as a complaint because I understand that sometimes these things happen. But do you know what is the lowest attended Sunday of the year in the United States? What is the Sunday with the lowest attendance? The Sunday after Easter Sunday, and right now we can see that, although of course, now we have in English that it is there too and that would take up a little more.

But what I want to say is that one understands, and why is that so? Because sometimes, people invest so much in that week in so many different things, in parties, going out, in new clothes and they come to the house of the Lord, and the glory of God, it is full for an event, special numbers and all this. , and the nervous system seems to get a little tired, and like one secretly says to oneself: well, you know what? It's time to take a little break, I'm going to rest, I'm going to stay at home calmly.

And that may be it, it may be that, you know, I don't want to criticize anyone unnecessarily, there are reasons, there are things. But I like people who look, even if they are crawling, they come to the House of the Lord, no matter how they serve God, and they say: you know what? I am not going to let myself be carried away by my emotions, we must give glory and honor to the Lord, we must support our Congregation, we must be there. Do you understand what I mean?

They do not sin by not coming, but sometimes, my desire, my desire is that we have an always vertical, trustworthy Congregation, of people committed to the Lord no matter what. Detailed people with God. People who when there is something to do say: I am present here, that we are not like the leaf in the wind that goes where the wind takes it. People who look at the culture and say: oh look, it seems that so-and-so just said that this should be the case and that he changed his mind, and now he sees the Bible in a different way; Ah, well, let's go, if so-and-so says, I'm going to go with him too. Instead of saying: no, what does the Word of God say? and they remain firm, with agony and struggle in their hearts but they remain firm in what the Word of the Lord says and they continue on.

God blesses those types of people, God supports them, God prospers them because they have made a pact with God, they have committed themselves in their hearts. Unlike people who come to Church simply because others come, because it's customary, because my grandmother did it, because my mom did it, and they just like Church, they see a new place.

People sometimes come to browse. A new place, more comfortable chairs, they are still hard but when they get softer they don't come to Church anymore because the world is full of it, Christianity is full of it. I would say that unfortunately, many times, they do things that way out of emotions.

That's why I don't get carried away: oh, we have a full Church! And what do I know, I don't know how much, no, I always look at what happens at the end, I always look at the end; Maybe people say that I am of little faith but no, I have already learned what human nature is. And what I ask is that you and I be people of commitment, of covenant with God, that we be clear people with the Lord, that we be firm, that we make a pact as Jacob did because God is a firm God in His Word and His purpose.

When God commits himself to something, he fulfills it because God is a complete God. God takes himself seriously and he takes us seriously, that's why God can make covenants with us, because he takes us seriously. If God did not take us seriously and did not see us as a considerable entity, He would not make a pact with us, He would treat us as mere objects.

It always overwhelms me when I think about how serious God takes me and the power I have to affect the Kingdom of God with my actions, my decisions, my words and everything else. And so it should be with you, you must take yourself seriously because you affect. Your family, your marriage, your children, your community, your Church, what you do has weight, it affects your environment and God knows this, and that is why God takes you very seriously. Because God takes us seriously, God makes covenants with us, because He takes Himself seriously and sees us as a covenant-worthy entity as well.

When God moves in something He does it deliberately, He does it with great seriousness and with great weight, and that is why God expects us to act that way with Him as well. And I believe that this seriousness that God assigns to His treatment with us also has something to do with the dignity that He assigns to Himself, the glory, the magnificence, the care that He has of Himself. God likes those people who have that quality of integrity and seriousness that He has and He likes to deal with them.

Another interesting thing: when God makes a covenant with someone, that covenant becomes firm and God keeps it for several generations, and that covenant affects your children and your children's children as well, and affects everything over which you have authority. . Your grandchildren are blessed, your great-grandchildren are blessed when a man or a woman makes a serious pact with God and commits to serve the Lord and be faithful to the Lord.

This morning I was reading the meditation of God Speaks Today, that message that we send through the Internet page to which I encourage you to sign up by the way, and it is a famous writing by Charles Spurgeon, the famous preacher of the 19th century. And Charles Spurgeon says the following which for me somewhat affirms that idea of God who makes a pact with a man, a woman and then keeps it, and through that pact he blesses subsequent generations.

Look what Charles Spurgeon says, he says, "Anxiety for our family is natural, but we would be wise to turn it into concern for our own character. If we walk before the Lord in integrity, we will do more to bless our descendants than if we inherited them." properties. The holy life of a father is a rich legacy for his children." A father or a mother, that I can say that my mother has blessed us and her subsequent generations in a precious way. A serious woman before God, filled with the Holy Spirit, committed to God, blesses her family. This is not only for men but for every father and mother who takes God seriously.

"The holy life of a father and mother is a rich legacy for their children. The upright man leaves his example to his heirs, and this in itself is a mine of true wealth. How many men" I would say women "can attribute his success in life to the example of his parents? he also leaves his reputation" that is, the father leaves his spiritual fame and integrity to his children, "men have a better concept of us as children of a man who was trustworthy or the successors of a merchant of excellent reputation, oh that all the young men were eager to safeguard the family name.

Above all, he leaves his children his prayers and the blessing of a God who hears prayers, and these prayers make our offspring" that is, our children, our descendants, "be favored among the children of men. God will save them even after we have died, oh that they were saved immediately. Our integrity can be God's instrument to save our sons and our daughters.

If they see the truth of our faith demonstrated by our lives, they might believe in Jesus for themselves. Lord, fulfill this Word for my family." Blessed be the Lord. Is it true or not? amen. The Word of God spoken by a man who lived and served the Lord with integrity.

So it is important that you understand your life, your relationship with God, your seriousness with God, the way you walk with God, seriousness. The firmness with which you keep your pact that you have made with the Lord is going to have a terrible effect on your entire family, your descendants, your economy, everything. Hey me, if men took that seriously, and women. I say men because sometimes we men, the truth is: we need brother men like never before, in our time like never before, men who hug their children like my brother is here hugging his son, cover him like this, fight for their children like lions, not just the women. Men who take the legacy they leave their children seriously, take time to warm their children, leave an example for their children.

Every so often one hears of men who leave their children because they fell in love with another little woman out there and leave the legacy, like Esau, sacrifices his birthright for an animal appetite; May God sincerely rebuke the devil, and they don't know the damage they are doing by stabbing their children, and they dirtying themselves in vileness, the greatest dirt of all.

By the way: marriage is a pact. Marriage is not a contract, I don't see it as a contract, perhaps a civil contract. Marriage is a covenant, a covenant that a woman and a man make and mutually give to each other, a promise. I'm going to love you, I'm going to serve you, I'm going to be with you until I die or you die and you can count on me. Even if I get ugly or you, or whatever, or get sick, or have no money, she says to him: I'm going to be with you old man, and he says the same to her too; and that woman feels safe, you know?

She knows that when she gets to be 50, 60, he's not going to leave her just because he gave her his word, he made a commitment to her. His heart, his life, his dignity, his integrity as a man is committed to fulfilling that word, no matter what. That's security, that's what's been lost today, that's what people don't understand and I could go into another spiel in there about marriage today, how it's being threatened and all that, and that's why ; It is because today people no longer see marriage for what it really is: it is something sacred, intimate, personal that involves the most intimate part of a human being and that does not respond to cultural changes or strange definitions. It is something that God has established, that commitment, that seriousness, that delivery and we have to maintain that and be people of pact, people of our word, people of integrity.

Our yes should be yes and our no should be no says the Word of the Lord, all Christians have to be known as pact people. When you say something to someone you keep your word. If you're an employee of a company or whatever you give eight hours of work for eight hours of pay, and you're not out there wasting time in the bathroom texting someone, gossiping and gossiping. No, they are paying me and I have to do my job, do you understand?

You respect the laws, you pay what you owe. Do not go there because, brothers I am still waiting for Christians to whom I lend money to pay me, I sincerely tell you brothers, how sad. It is easier to expect from a non-Christian person many times than from a Christian to pay you what he owes you, terrible. Because no, there isn't, the people, where is the word? if you owe something, pay it, you know? The Bible says: Do not owe anything to anyone, to whom glory, glory, to whom honor, honor, to whom money, money but pay him. To Caesar what is Caesar's and to God what is God's, always remember that.

You owe your children: integrity, seriousness, protection, firmness, care, teaching, pay your children. You owe your wife or husband: loyalty, love, care, pay him back. You owe your Church: consistency, support, endorsement, pay it back. You owe God: praise, glory, honor, soul, life, body, everything, pay God. Covenant people, serious people, commitment people, and the Lord likes that.

Brother: we can do, listen to this, it is very important, we can make pacts with God. I have sometimes heard, I have read from time to time theologians who say that no, the pacts always have to be God who initiates them and that man cannot make pacts with God but it has to be God, that what they see in the According to them, the Bible is simply God making pacts with men, I don't believe that. I don't see it that way in the Bible. Whoever says that is contradicting what is seen in Scripture.

First of all, God takes us very seriously and He is willing. Now, if you make a crazy pact: Lord, I'm going to serve you if you give me a mansion in Bel Air over there in California and four cars or whatever, that's something tacky. No, the pacts are serious, they have to be within the laws. But when a man, a man can come before God and make covenants.

King Josiah for example made a pact with God, you can find this later, we read it a while back. Second Chronicles 29 so that you understand because that is something that I have heard many times and it seemed a little strange to me, and I made sure to look it up in the Bible that you cannot make pacts with God, one starting it.

And look at Second Chronicles 29:10, Second Chronicles 29:10, Josiah says and we studied this a couple of weeks ago, not specifically, but it says: "Now therefore, I have determined to make a covenant with Jehovah, the God of Israel so that His fierce anger may turn away from us. My children, do not deceive yourselves now because Jehovah has chosen you to stand before Him and serve Him, and be His ministers, and burn incense to Him." I like that Word of Josiah: "I have determined today to make a covenant with the Lord, the God of Israel." God wants to make a covenant and He likes willing people who are willing to make a covenant with Him.

And there are other passages as well that speak clearly. Jacob made that pact, I make a pact with you today, this is my agreement with you, I am going to serve you all the days of my life, I expect your protection, your care as one expects from any king who covers one with his protection and his provision, Jacob made a covenant with God. David says in one passage: "And who wants to make a pact with God today?" I think it was when he set aside money for the new temple, the temple that he was going to build.

It says, "I have set aside my wealth." It says: "I have set aside gold, silver, bronze, wood for the construction of the temple." He says: "And from my own money, from my own possessions I have also set aside" he was not satisfied with only national money but rather says "from my own treasury I set aside money for the construction of the temple, and who now wants to make a pact with God? also?" In other words, people who make a covenant with God can challenge others to make a covenant with the Lord as well. God always loved David for that care he had about His Glory.

And so God likes serious people who are willing to make covenants with Him, and God has already made a covenant with all mankind through His Son Jesus Christ. Christ died on the cross so that all may be saved. In a sense, the whole world is now under God's new covenant, so what God wants now is people who sign that covenant that God has made and say: no, I want to make a covenant within that covenant with God, I'm going to serve the Lord under the banner of Christ Jesus. I say amen to Your covenant Lord, I establish a covenant with You now and I will serve You, and I will follow You. The only thing we have to do now is ratify that pact for ourselves and our children, we have to enter into the pact.

Now I would say that one can, within the pact that God has already initiated and that I now ratify with my word and my signature, even within that greater pact there are smaller pacts that you can make with God in your life. I encourage you to be a man, a woman of pact, that you say: you know what? I'm not going to be just any Christian, I'm not going to be satisfied simply with that well, I already have my passport stamped and I'm going to heaven, I know that even if I'm tacky and mediocre in the way I serve to the Lord, God is going to save me because it is not by works but by grace, there are many people like that and God sees the hearts of those people.

And they are going to be saved because again, salvation is not by works, listen to me but: do you know who God loves and prefers, and is he satisfied? The man and the woman who says: do you know what Lord? I am not going to be satisfied with simply going to heaven, I am going to serve you with all my heart, with all my mind and with all my strength, I am going to love you above all things, I am going to prefer you above all the gods. Everything that I have is going to be Yours, everything that I am, everything that I know, everything that I reach is for Your Glory and I am going to live for You meticulously all the days of my life; God sees that person and says: With that man, with that woman I want to have deals. I am going to bless him, I am going to fight with him and for him, I am going to get him out of all his troubles.

When I fail, I am going to forgive him if he repents and I am going to bless him, and I am going to bless his sons and his daughters, and I am going to put him on high, and I am going to make him influential in the community, and I am going to give him the joy of My salvation, and I will accompany him in his illnesses, in his struggles, in his sorrows, his tribulations, his trials and his absences, and I will comfort him at night when he is sad and anxious because he loves me, I prefer and be attentive to My Glory and My Person. Those people God wants to bless them.

That is, even within the greater covenant that God has established through Jesus Christ, God calls you and me this morning to make a covenant with Him personally. People don't know what they lose when they live before God tacky within a generic agreement, like those general contracts that lawyers make, you know, those boiler plate contracts as they call them, that you buy there at Wall Green's or e Staple's.