James McCann - Class 4: The Rechabites Honoring your Inheritance

Automatically transcribed. Accuracy is good but not perfect, and words are sometimes wrong. Trust the audio over the text.

1. 0:00

   Well, this morning we have a beautiful and powerful legacy that stretches on for thousands of years, in fact. And I don't know whether, you know, the Rechabites is well known to you, but when I started looking at this idea of legacies, there were many legacies in the Bible that were, you know, sort of well known to me.

2. 0:19

   But this one was a little gem that I found that to me was not well known, and yet it just proliferates through scripture as to the number of links that this legacy has. But the Rechabites are found in the book of Jeremiah, in Jeremiah chapter 35. And we'll be heading there, but just as we sort of go to Jeremiah 35, let's just think a little bit about Jeremiah's message particularly.

3. 0:43

   Because I don't know whether you've ever had a crack at, you know, sort of getting into Jeremiah, but I personally find it very hard to study because it's not in chronological order. And Jeremiah seems to place themes and concepts together, and from that, his message is really to the families of the house of Israel, which I find this very much applicable to our studies this week.

4. 1:06

   And so Jeremiah was this call to the nation to hear the word of Yahweh. And that's exactly what we're here for this week, aren't we? To hear the word and to have it in our hearts. But when we look at the themes of Jeremiah, some words keep popping up over and over again.

5. 1:24

   And these are the words, return. It exists 47 times in the book of Jeremiah. But the word listen, obey and hearken nearly occurs 200 times in this book. And you can see that the emphasis of Jeremiah is to listen to God, hear what his message is. Because unfortunately, he was called to speak to a nation who were not listening.

6. 1:51

   It says, I spake unto you, rising up early, but you heard not. And I called you, but you answered not. And so, brothers and sisters, when we look at the book of Jeremiah, sometimes it can be quite, you know, a book of a lot of negatives in there. But isn't it glorious that some of the visions in Jeremiah and some of the words that he says about God's plan with this nation are just so beautiful and uplifting.

7. 2:17

   But here, in the middle of Jeremiah, is this little rose between the thorns. If we look at the chapters of Jeremiah, we can see that in just taking this little snapshot here, in chapters 27 to 34, we have it during Zedekiah's reign. And there's a warning over and over again for them not listening.

8. 2:38

   And the judgments that God would bring upon Israel because them not heeding to his word. And of course, from chapter 37 on, we have, of course, still in the time of Zedekiah. The rain and all the fall of Jerusalem then takes place. But all the way through that section is, again, warnings for not listening to God.

9. 2:58

   But here, tucked in the middle of this little section of Zedekiah's reign is a little jump back to the time of Jehoiakim. And there's two chapters here that are inserted in the record of Jeremiah. The first one is in chapter 35 on the Rechabites. And in chapter 36, we have Jehoiakim cutting up the law of God.

10. 3:19

    But this little chapter here, chapter 35, is an absolute gem. Because what God is actually doing in this record is presenting to us, in a sense, the contrast to Israel's failure. He's going to present a little family of people who did listen to the word of God. And these are the Rechabites. And we're going to find that the Rechabites are always placed as an example and a contrast to Israel in their failure to listen to God.

11. 3:50

    Here is Jeremiah placing them forward as a wonderful example of how they did listen to their father and they did listen to God. So just come to Jeremiah 35 and let's actually have a look at even how they're introduced. Because God actually comes to Jeremiah and he says, what I want you to do, Jeremiah, is I want you to go into, in verse 2, the house of the Rechabites.

12. 4:14

    And I'd like you to speak to them. I'd like you to bring them into the house of God. And I want you to put before them wine to drink. And what God's doing is he knows what the Rechabites are going to do. He knows the way they're going to respond to that situation.

13. 4:30

    But he wants to show Israel how faithful this family were. And so Jeremiah does that. But what's beautiful is even their names tell us a little story about this family. In verse 2 and 3, we can actually see that Jeremiah comes in and he takes Jazaniah, the son of Jeremiah, and Habazaniah and his brethren and all the sons of the house of Rechab.

14. 4:54

    He brings these family in. But look at the meanings of these names. Listen to Yahweh. Yahweh will raise and exult and the light of Yahweh. Here is a family who listens to God's word. They exult at high and they are the light to Israel around them. It's magnificent. That's why God wanted to use them as a little example and a little excitation to the house of Israel.

15. 5:24

    Why is it? What was this family noted for? We'll have a look at verse 14 to 16. Here is God saying, Why won't you listen to my words? Why won't you hearken to me? Because the words of Jonadab, the son of Rechab, that he commanded his sons not to drink wine, are performed.

16. 5:46

    So when you brought this family in, Jeremiah, and you put wine before them, and they said, I'm sorry, we can't do that. And the reason why we can't do that is because we were commanded, and if you can see, this is their response in verse 6. We will not drink of the wine because Jonadab, the son of Rechab, our father commanded us saying, You will not do that.

17. 6:08

    And we are faithful to what our father has told us. So God sets them forward. He goes, Look at what they have done. They have performed the word of their father. For unto this day they drink none, but obey their father's commandment. And I tried to do the same with Israel. I've risen up early.

18. 6:33

    I've sent my prophets. But you haven't listened to me. And I've sent them early, day after day. And I've cried, Return every man from his evil way and from his doings. But you have not listened to me. You have not inclined your ear. At the end of verse 15. But because the sons of Jonadab, the son of Rechab, have performed the commandment of their father, which he commanded them, they are an example to you that you have not listened to me.

19. 7:03

    And you know, brothers and sisters, we can sit and listen to study after study after study at Bible school or Sunday or Bible class. Do we really listen to what the word of God is telling us? And what's beautiful is that the way that scripture records things is just to drop these little hints in for us so that we can draw some lessons and parallels.

20. 7:25

    If you had a little colouring in pencil, it's a really important little task to do. And we're just going to sow the seed now. And we'll come back to why I've asked you to do this a little bit later. But I want you to notice that the phrase, the house of the Rechabites, is mentioned four times in this chapter.

21. 7:41

    And it tells us that he commanded or charged his family to do a certain thing six times. And it tells us that they obeyed. And it tells us four times that they obeyed. In other words, brothers and sisters, the house of Rechab is noted for being a house of obedience to their father.

22. 8:05

    But in contrast, we actually have Israel here in the chapter who hearken not. Same concept, but this time it's mentioned five times. You haven't listened to your father as he has instructed you is what God is trying to show them. And what's beautiful is five times we are told in the chapter that the Rechabites did perform.

23. 8:31

    They did what their father asked them and they kept it. And I love the meanings of these words, brothers and sisters, because it's as if the key of how we keep our father's commandments is here in them. To perform means to rise, to raise our father's commandments as being a priority and importance in our life.

24. 8:51

    And of course, we hedge it about, we protect it, we guard it, and we keep it because it is our life. As Moses tells us in Deuteronomy. So it's a beautiful little family, isn't it? With great excitations for us. But if you were like me when you first read this chapter, you were scratching your head going, well, who are the Rechabites?

25. 9:13

    Important question to answer. So what we can do is we can sort of follow it back through scripture and try and find out who the house of Rechab were and who was Jonadab. Well, if we take a bit of a leap back, let's go all the way to 1 Chronicles chapter 2.

26. 9:34

    Because here, Ezra picks up on giving us a lineage and he drops in some important detail here in 1 Chronicles chapter 2. Now, I just want you to note as we look at 1 Chronicles 2, how it begins in the chapter. It says, these are the sons of Israel. And then, of course, it runs through.

27. 10:01

    But as we follow the chapter all the way down through the end with names that I cannot pronounce, you get all the way through to verse 55. And here we are introduced to a family of scribes. It's an interesting little piece of information. And as we go through this family of scribes, we are told right at the end of verse 55 that these are the Kenites that came from Hemath, the father of the house of Rechab.

28. 10:34

    So the house of Rechab is linked here to the Kenites. And the word Rechab, brothers and sisters, means rider. We're going to come back to that in a minute because it keeps coming up, again, in the family legacy. But a family of scribes is quite an interesting little aspect for us to think about because when we look at the parable that Christ gave in Matthew 13, he says that every scribe who is instructed in the kingdom of heaven is like unto a householder who brings forth his treasures, things new and old.

29. 11:10

    So I want you to imagine what we do as we take notes if we hear in a talk. We just jot something down. We get it, oh, there's a little piece of information. We put it in our notepad. We tuck it away in our Bible or we write it in our margin. And then later on, a few years later, when we might be sitting around doing the daily Bible readings, there's that little note that might just give us a little bit of a hint as to what that meant.

30. 11:33

    We go, oh. And we can pull that little note out, whether it's new or old, and insert it into the conversations in our Bible readings. And suddenly it brings that little chapter alive because we've tucked it away and we've kept it for later. And isn't it, brothers and sisters, a really wonderful thing that like here at Bible School, we actually have at the end of the week when all the kids stand up, we give it like a little reward to them for keeping a little notebook.

31. 12:00

    Why do we do that? Because we're trying to encourage them to start at young age and be little scribes and jot down the things that they hear so that later on as they look through their Bible marking, they'll have something that they can pull out and go, oh, wow. Didn't know what that was then, but now it makes sense.

32. 12:18

    And here is this little family who have inscribed little things into their hearts and later on they're able to pull it out and make sense of the Word of God and to grow thereby. But this little verse here gives us another question. Who are the Kenites? So we need to keep going and keep digging.

33. 12:36

    So if we want to follow the Kenites now, let's go back to Judges chapter 1. And you can see that this legacy is starting to stretch out.

34. 12:51

    So here in Judges chapter 1, particularly in verse 16, we actually have the Kenites mentioned again. And it says that the children of the Kenite, Moses' father-in-law, went up out of the city of palm trees with the children of Judah. So here we have the Kenites actually linked as being of the family of Moses' father-in-law.

35. 13:17

    Now, why that's a fascinating fact, brothers and sisters, is because these people were Gentiles. Here is a group of people whose lineage traces all the way through to Jeremiah 35 is where we started. But they began right back with Moses' father-in-law as a group of Gentiles. And if we sort of want to go back and find out where that was, just quickly again, come back to Numbers chapter 10.

36. 13:45

    I'm sorry your fingers are doing the walking, but you can see how important it is to pick up on some of these little aspects of where this family have come from. But here in Numbers chapter 10, we can see that in verse 28, that the children of Israel were journeying according to their armies and they were set forward.

37. 14:05

    And in verse 29, Moses says to Hobad, the son of Raguel, the Midianite, his father-in-law, we are journeying to the place of which Yahweh said, I will give it you. Come now with us and we will do thee good, for Yahweh has spoken good concerning Israel. So here's Moses actually saying to his father-in-law, we've got the promises, the hope of Israel, and we're going to the promised land and we want you to come too and be a part of the hope of Israel because God has spoken good concerning Israel.

38. 14:38

    And in verse 30, he says, I will not go, but I will depart to mine own land and to mine own kindred. And Moses pleads again, he says, leave us not, I pray thee, for as much as thou knowest how we are here to encamp in the wilderness, that thou mayest be to us instead of our eyes.

39. 14:58

    And so this question is left lingering, brothers and sisters, here in the wilderness. That they're called to be a part of this family, to join themselves to Israel and the promises of Abraham and an inheritance in the land. It's left lingering. Will you come with us? No, we'll go back to our own land.

40. 15:16

    And Moses pleads again, come with us. So brothers and sisters, did they join? Did they take up Moses' question to be a part of Israel? Well, of course they did. Because you know what we read in 1 Chronicles 2? The very start of that chapter begins with, these are the sons of Israel.

41. 15:41

    And they're listed in that chapter as being part of the sons of Israel. Because they did grasp hold of the things concerning Israel. They grasped hold of the hope of Israel. And what's beautiful, brothers and sisters, is if we go back to Judges, just, sorry, let's just head back to Judges chapter 1.

42. 16:02

    They're listed here in this chapter with faithful Judah who are going up into the land to take their inheritance. And here in Judges 1 from 10 all the way through to 20 is a list of the Rechabites and how they were with Judah and Caleb and the ones who were faithful in going up to take the inheritance.

43. 16:27

    This family wanted to dwell with God's faithful. They wanted to take the inheritance that God had promised them. But what's interesting here in Judges 1, did you notice that the chapter goes on to talk about a group of Israelites that didn't take their inheritance seriously? Verse 27, neither did Manasseh drive out the inhabitants.

44. 16:52

    Verse 29, neither did Ephraim. Verse 30, neither did Zebulun. Verse 31, neither did Asher. Verse 33, neither did Naphtali. What's beautiful, brothers and sisters, is that the Rechabite legacy seems to always be there as a contrast to Israel's failure. That here is a little Gentile family who took hold of the promises to God more than Israel or some of them who should have known better what their inheritance was all about.

45. 17:25

    And so we find those exact same principles embedded in this family. They knew the wonderful hope of Israel. Had being Gentiles, they grasped hold of it and they were never going to let it go. So if we were to march forward in time and follow this family through, let's jump now to 2 Kings chapter 10 and see how all the way even down through the times of the kings we have this faithful family mentioned again.

46. 17:56

    And this is of course the time of Jonadab. Now in 2 Kings chapter 10 we have this story of Jehu being commanded by God to destroy the house of Ahab. And we read in 2 Kings chapter 10 particularly in verse 11 that he slew all that remained of the house of Ahab. But he rises up and he goes off in verse 13 to meet the brethren of Ahaziah king of Judah and of course being the powerful man that he does that he goes and wreaks God's judgment upon Ahab's family.

47. 18:37

    But look at this little scenario here in verse 15. Here we have that he departs off in his furious driving and as he's driving along he lights upon Jehonadab the son of Rechab coming out to meet him and he salutes him and he says to him now notice this is your heart right with my heart?

48. 18:59

    And Jehonadab answered it is. So here's Jehu going off to wreak vengeance on the house of Ahab because of their immorality as God had commanded him and he sees Jehonadab coming out to meet him because Jehonadab is also in tune with the heart of God in removing the iniquity and idol worship from Israel.

49. 19:24

    He was a family faithful to that call. So it says he goes give me your hand he gives him his hand and he takes him up into the chariot and verse 16 he says come with me and see my zeal for Yahweh so he made him ride in his chariot there's our word Rechab he made him ride in his chariot so here these two go off together to destroy the house of Ahab and of course in verses 18 onwards we have the story of how Jehu gathers together the house of Ahab and all the Baal worshippers and this story I suppose has this sort of degree of humour about it doesn't it as he sort of says I have a great sacrifice for Baal get all the people who worship Baal together come I want to worship with Baal get them all in here are there any of those prophets of Yahweh get rid of them we don't want them get all the prophets of Baal in here right are we all here destroys them all in one hit but what's interesting to note brothers and sisters is this little phrase here in verse 23 and Jehu went and Jehonadab the son of Rechab into the house of Baal and of course this is where they search and look to see whether there are any servants of Yahweh they wanted to remove them but they wanted to destroy the house of Baal did you notice if you flick down through these verses here how many times does the house of Baal come up verse 23 once verse 25 they went into the city of the house

50. 20:59

    of Baal verse 26 they brought forth the images out of the house of Baal and burned them verse 27 they break down the image of Baal and break down the house of Baal four times this is mentioned in this chapter it's as if brothers and sisters we have this contrast between the house of Rechab and the house of Baal they wanted to be a clear distinction that our house is not going to be the house of Baal we will have our heart set aright with our God and what's fascinating is this number four comes up a lot in association with Israel here's just a simple list that sort of put together for the moment but even the Israelitish house wasn't it was to be designed on this principle of the four pillars of like the four horns of the altar their houses were meant to be houses of prayer their houses were meant to be God's houses what was living in that house was meant to be the principles of God not the principles of Baal and brothers and sisters we've been challenged this week through many different aspects to think about what are the things that fill our house are the idols of the world in our house or are the things of God and his word do we have a house of Baal or are we producing a house like Rechab now this point in time here if we think about it is showing to us how amazing this legacy is if we follow through how long lasting these things took you can follow the time where Moses invites his father-in-law in numbers 10

51. 22:36

    and these are approximate dates sorry I couldn't get the month and day but it wasn't available on Google but if you can follow this through you can see that right from the very call of that family to the Kenites as they entered the land to Jehonadab here in the time of Ahab all the way through now to Jeremiah 35 to the Rechabites this is a legacy brothers and sisters that it has extended for an enormous amount of time and it shows you how important it is for us to embed into our families things that even though they might be small might last for eternity their legacies of value legacies of worth legacies that our families will want to carry on and if you think of Jonadab here in in second Kings chapter 10 you might sort of go well how is that relevant to the time of Jeremiah 35 the house of Baal that was really back here in Kings wasn't it well let's just go across to Jeremiah 32 there's nothing new under the sun and as much as the removal of Baal in this time by Jehu was the object of divine judgment unfortunately Baal kept coming up over and over again in Israelite history here in Jeremiah chapter 32 in verse 33 God is actually saying that you have provoked me to anger how Jeremiah 32 verse 33 you have turned to me your back he goes even though I've risen early teaching you you have not hearkened to me to receive instruction you have set your abominations in the house which is called by my name to defile it you've turned your

52. 24:32

    house and my house into a house look at this in verse 35 of a place of Baal that's what you've done you've allowed this immorality of Baal to continue which I've told you not to do you have not listened and brothers and sisters the problem of immorality and of idol worship and of idolatry and all those principles will be forever an issue that we need to fight and stand against and that's why the legacy of the things that we put into our houses is so vitally important because we need to get rid of these things that can hold back and be an influence for evil to our families and what's beautiful is here in Jeremiah 32 we have as we said before some of the depressing thoughts I suppose about the immorality that and the abominations that Judah were involved with but then these wonderful little snapshots of glory and God says in verse 36 that although he would deliver them into the hand of the king of Babylon look at this in verse 37 behold I will gather them out of all countries and with it I have driven them in mine anger and in my fury and I will bring them again to this place and I will cause them to dwell safely and they shall be my people and I will be their God now now that brothers and sisters is Genesis 17 it's the Abrahamic covenant coming out now this is highly significant because this is what is embedded in the hope of Israel remember what Moses said come with us for God has spoken good concerning Israel wasn't that the promises

53. 26:14

    to Israel through Abraham now notice this in verse 39 and I will give them one heart and one way that they may fear me forever for the good of them and of their children after them this is the legacy that God wanted to them have instilled in them and I will make with them an everlasting covenant and I will not that they will not turn away from me to do them good but I will put my fear in their hearts isn't that brothers and sisters what Jehu asked Jehonadab is your heart right with my heart because I'm going off to do the judgments of God he goes it is my heart is in line with the things of God because the fear of God was in his heart and that's why he says yay I will rejoice over them to do good and I will plant them in this land assuredly that's why the promises to Abraham are as sure and as certain as anything we could ever see with our own eyes because here God says with my whole heart and with my whole soul have I promised that do you know brothers and sisters this is the only occurrence in all of the Bible of God's heart and soul that's how important it is to God that's the legacy that he wants in his families so when we come across to Jeremiah 35 what is in the heart of this family well we have here in this chapter that exact principle being picked up what they feared was God they feared their father's word they feared their father's principles because here it is in

54. 28:03

    verse 6 and 7 we will not drink wine for Jonadab the son of Rechab our father has commanded us that we will not drink wine neither us or our sons forever neither will we build a house nor will we sow a seed nor plant vineyards nor even have vineyards but all our days we shall dwell in tents that we may live long we may live many days in the land whereof we are strangers here was a family whose in their heart was the fear of their father's commandments and because of that they were performing those things you see brothers and sisters way back with Jehonadab was this principle that they had to see that their way of life was different from the lives of the Gentiles around them to use what our brother Roger was talking about this morning and so therefore the principles of God had to be seen as a distinction in their walk from the walk from all the things that the people of the world lusted after and wanted to take hold of so here is a list of do's and don'ts they were not to drink wine they were not to build a house they were not to sow seed nor to plant vineyards or even have them but what they were to do was to dwell in tents and to live in the land as strangers now if we stop and just sort of try and digest some of what is here in this list try and think why is it that they were told that they were not allowed to plant vineyards or to have any why would Jehonadab

55. 29:42

    have put that as being an important part of his legacy well it's interesting that Jehonadab actually lived in the time of Ahab didn't he and one of the most I suppose you know unfortunate happenings in the life of Ahab was his treatment of Naboth faithful Naboth and he wanted because of you know Naboth had this vineyard he wanted to take that land and make it into his own little herb garden but this was the faith of Naboth Yahweh forbid it me that I should give the inheritance of my fathers to you you see Naboth was a man who cherished and loved the inheritance that God had promised through Abraham to his children and he wasn't going to let that go just so someone could provide him with a little bit of extra cash that was irrelevant and here brothers and sisters if you were Jehonadab and you were looking on at what was going on here you would say boys you're not going to be like that we are going to do something different our walk is going to be different from the walk of those around us and this list of do's and don'ts brothers and sisters I think really exemplify the beautiful things that we were talking about not only this morning with our brother Roger but last night with our brother Rod from Colossians 3 the scriptures don't just give us a list of rules that says thou shalt not there is the emphasis isn't it on the things that we should put on the things that we should do it's not a list of rules that we say tick tick tick

56. 31:23

    we haven't done those things we've got to fill it with the positive wonderful things of the truth and that's what I think verse 7 is telling us and there's a big word here that I think it's worth underlining because when we see in verse 7 the list of do's and don'ts we have right at the end here this word that ye may dwell that is telling us that they didn't just hand them a list of rules what Johannes was trying to do was actually give a spiritual reason to his family as to why they had to do this and not do that there was a principle behind it we do this differently because there is something more important something better something of worth there was a beautiful command behind this so here in verse 7 the spiritual reason the spirit of the law that's given is passed on to the boys and there's two little aspects that come out of this did you notice it says that you live long in the land where you were strangers now these two aspects come out because they're trying to show us that here John Adab wasn't actually trying to you know start his own legacy he was carrying on those of those who came before because that phrase live long in the land is taken from the ten commandments and brother rod was mentioning this last night and it's just so wonderful how when you do go to bible schools they all the like all the themes seem to fit and talk and they all seem to show us the one right principles running through the scriptures

57. 33:04

    all keep us coming back to these wonderful principles of what we should do for our god and here we actually see that we should live long in the land was something that was embedded in the ten commandments and it had to do with honoring your father and your mother that thy days may be long upon the land which yahweh thy god giveth thee and of course we saw with uncle rod last night in ephesians 6 this is picked up as being obey your parents and here paul adds in that it's the first commandment with promise because attached to this is the abrahamic legacy because that's why he says where we are strangers because it was abraham wasn't it that went into the promised land as a stranger and a sojourner and hebrews 11 tells us that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth and they were strangers and pilgrims to the people around them brothers and sisters because their way of life and the things that they wanted were different from what the canaanites wanted because they look for a city whose builder and maker is god and here in these boys is the abrahamic legacy being lived on but one of the things we sort of can see from this verse is why does paul call it the first commandment with promise sorry this is a slight digression but it's interesting that to see this idea that attached to this idea of honoring your father and mother is the promised land itself just a few quotes from deuteronomy that it may go well with you in the land and your children after you here's

58. 34:47

    the legacy which yahweh thy god giveth thee forever that's definitely an abrahamic link deuteronomy 6 this is where we started on saturday night yahweh the god of thy fathers has promised thee in the land he said it was the promise given to the fathers deuteronomy 6 that thou mayest go in to possess the good land which yahweh swear unto thy fathers so attached to this idea of honoring your father and mother is the promised land because brothers and sisters that land was given to abraham's seed so therefore that's why god says in genesis 18 that i know abraham that he will command his children and his household after him to keep the way of yahweh to do justice and judgment that god may bring upon abraham all the things that he's promised so the honoring of your father and your mother was in a sense as if you were following it all the way back to the father of us all the father of the faithful because when we come to obey our father and mother whom we can see we learn brothers and sisters to obey our father in heaven whom we can't see and if we can do it to those who we can see then of course we will demonstrate our faith to our god who is in heaven it's beautiful to see this idea of these two principles sorry but another small digression if we look at the idea of inheritance in the land the law also tells us very definitively that it was linked to the keeping of the sabbath and the reason why that's beautiful brothers and sisters is because

59. 36:28

    the fourth commandment in the list is the sabbath and then the fifth commandment is honoring your father and mother and the reason why the sabbath was linked to the keeping of the land is because god says when you go into the land you need to be thinking about my principles not yours why because that land isn't actually yours that land is mine and i want you to be a stranger and a sojourner with me he goes i want you to leave behind the things of canaan and i want you to be focused on me and be a stranger and pilgrim pilgrim to the world because you are walking with me like abraham did and so brothers and sisters we can see how beautifully all these little aspects tie together that we should be thinking about these principles day by day in our family and injecting these principles into their hearts and minds and i think that when johonadab was speaking to his family and looking particularly in the time of ahab he saw that israel's failure was based on something quite very simple and i'd like you to come back with me to georonomy chapter 32 because israel had been warned hundreds of years before about their failure and where their failure would come from and here in georonomy chapter 32 is moses trying to instruct the people the importance of remembering god in their in their life for instance in verse 7 of georonomy chapter 32 remember the days of old and consider the years of many generations ask thy father and he will show thee thy elders and they will tell thee here's the importance of

60. 38:17

    passing on this legacy from father and mother to our children and so he goes through and talks about how yahweh's portion is his people jacob is the lot of his inheritance god values his inheritance brothers and sisters so much that he would even find them in a desert land in a waste howling place and he would keep them as the apple of his eye and like as an eagle stirs over her nest and flutters over her young so god would lead israel out isn't it beautiful that's the way that our father treats us that's the legacy that he can embed in our heart and it says that he alone did lead him and there was no strange god with him he made him ride now this is israel and there's our word brothers and sisters rekab he made him ride on the high places of the earth that's what god did to israel he lifted him out of obscurity and he made him ride as the greatest of all in a sense of all the nations on the earth in fact he tells us this in verse eight the most high even divided the nations in their inheritance he separated the sons of abaddon according to the children of israel so important was this inheritance and he did all these beautiful things verse verse 14 the butter of kind the milk of the sheep the fat of lambs the rams of the breed of bashan he gave them all the fat of the land and all the things that god has done in our life our brother hayden was talking about that at the start of the week how

61. 39:48

    thankful should we be for the things that god has done but if we lose that spirit of thankfulness this is what happens in verse 15 but jesher and wax fat and kicked and therefore he forsook god and lightly esteemed the rock of his salvation they forgot brothers and sisters how good it really was and we've seen that with our brother peter studies as well they wanted to go back to egypt can you imagine that here they were coming out delivered out of egypt from the hard bondage and they forgot it and they wanted to go back because we forget brothers and sisters what it's really like to be in the world don't we but jonadab wanted to instill into his family do not forget god's principles remember that you will always live differently from those around you so his response is you must be sober minded keep your mind on the things of god lift your minds above don't be affected or intoxicated by the things of this world don't settle down here brothers and sisters you are not a citizen or a resident of this world is what he told his boys in not building a house but i have no earthly possessions don't sow your seed and start building up your material wealth free yourself of materialism and ambition don't spend your time cultivating your vineyards or have any these are the things that are temporal these are the things that are now but you are to imitate your father you are to look for the things that are eternal and you are to grasp hold of them and it's just beautiful when we see

62. 41:29

    the mind of johonadab here in his family you can see that he's actually trying to get his family to be like the priests and the levites and shouldn't we spend our life brothers and sisters trying to be like our high priest to be like our father abraham to exhibit his faith and look for eternal things and that's why this legacy has to live on in us today because this is a massive challenge for our generation we've talked about theistic evolution we've talked about immorality but you know what brothers and sisters in that list that we were given it tells us that covetousness is idolatry that's just as bad because it intoxicates our mind and therefore we always want the next generation we want the iphone 12 we want the next imac pro we want the next this the next car the next house we want to build it you know bigger barns and so brothers and sisters the challenge for us is what are we allowing our minds to be affected by what are we listening to watching what are we reading are we focused on our job our career our home our investment our education you know sometimes we don't even get time to get to the meeting or the family i thought that was so beautiful last night when uncle rod said about the idea of honoring being that the greek word time you know it's just so classic do we give quality time and so here we see that our world has these possession gaining mentality that can suck us up so easily we can come to the come to the meeting and be talking

63. 43:09

    about this and that of our last holiday or our our car or whatever it is that we're doing and so brothers and sisters our lifestyle can sometimes be so much more important that we don't have time to get to the meeting because when we come to sunday we don't have time to get to sunday school because we're too tired we've just got back from the business trip we've just got back from this or that how much time brothers and sisters are we spending trying to imitate our father we need to be praying and reading and meditating and studying and building our spiritual relationships they're the things that we need to inject into our families and so the dual actions need to be in our house as well the idea of honoring and holding up and listening and obeying and all the positive things as well as making sure that bail and the idols of this world and the covetousness of this world are not a part of our families if christ be dead then seek those things which are above that are on the right hand of our god and what's fascinating is that even the the word jonadab if we were to look into jonadab tells us a little bit about his character jonadab means willing of yahweh or impelled of yahweh and this is the spirit brothers and sisters of thankfulness because when we follow this root word through the new the old testament we can actually see that this idea was the same spirit that was in the people who were bringing up to the to the offerings in exodus 35 when the temple the

64. 44:44

    temple was being formed and the tabernacle in the wilderness everyone whose spirit made them willing they willingly offered themselves the same spirit in the time of the building of the temple with solomon that brothers and sisters is the character of jonadab that we need to inject into our families the work of the truth and being willing to give because god loves a cheerful giver that's the importance brothers and sisters of putting the positives into our family so in jeremiah 35 when we look at jonadab and the house of rekab god says that they will never ever want a man to stand before me because when you get people with that spirit brothers and sisters it's that spirit that is going to be in the kingdom now brother peter was talking yesterday about as truly as i live all the earth shall be filled with the glory of yahweh in that context brothers and sisters what is the glory of yahweh we keep following the next few verses is caleb had a different spirit that's the spirit brothers and sisters it's going to fill the earth it's the glory that god has in us and of course why do we look at chapter 36 because here at this very same time as the legacy of the rekabites is being mentioned you have the king of israel getting the word of god and ripping it up sad isn't it brothers and sisters that that's exactly the way our world is treating the bible and everything and the principles that come from it so god's promise to this family is very clear that jonadab the son of rekab

65. 46:27

    shall not want a man to stand before me forever now how is that going to take place well because brothers and sisters if we just quickly go back to jeremiah 33 we can see that this is picked up as another kingdom vision in jeremiah 33 from verses 17 to 18 god tells us that david will never want a man to sit on the throne of the house of israel and verse 18 neither shall the priest the levites want a man before me to do sacrifice continually now if you look at the verses just before that and the verses just after that that is the time of those days where god will cause the righteous branch which is which is the lord jesus christ to grow up it is the time where the bride that's the she here in verse 16 will also be called yahweh our righteousness in fact so sure is this brothers and sisters that god says this is a covenant in verse 20 that if you can break the covenant of the day and the night then that's the way that you'll be able to break the covenant that i've just made here and we know that that's as certain as as certain as the sun rises every day brothers and sisters is as certain as what god has promised will come to pass and that's why this is telling us that jonadab's legacy is about people who will fill the kingdom and that's beautiful and amazing that this righteous branch of course shows us that it leads us that as all legacies do to the lord jesus christ now i've just been shown the five

66. 48:04

    minutes sign about three minutes ago so i'll quickly just try to draw the thoughts of this morning to a close but when we think about the lord jesus christ brothers and sisters don't all these things that jonadab commanded his children to obey don't they come up in the life of the lord jesus christ was the lord jesus christ a person that cultivated life for himself was he a person that sought after materialism and the stuff of this world was his mind intoxicated by all the things that went on around him well no christ himself says the foxes have holes the birds of the air have nests but the son of man doesn't even have a place to lay his head he doesn't have a home because what he was doing brothers and sisters was cultivating a house a spiritual house for you and i and even at the very point where it would have been for us we would have been sitting there going well it's humanly justifiable when you're in that much pain to have accepted that little drink at that moment christ is saying my mind must stay fixed and so he refused that drink there on the cross and the reason that he did all these things brothers and sisters is because the words of his father were forever in his heart and that's why he says i do always those things that please my father so our take-home messages for today are that rekab's legacy is to honor our inheritance above all to forsake the world brothers and sisters and desire the hope of israel more than what the world can offer

67. 49:38

    to honor our father and our mother to listen and obey to hearken to keep our hearts and our minds in christ on the things which are above and to see that every aspect of our life counts all the little things that we go after in our life don't seem like much but they mount up the stuff and the in a sense the concerns of this life but brothers and sisters let's be willing to give ourselves to the truth and to hold on to our inheritance and to never let it go you