Genesis 18:32
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Good evening. It's good to see everyone here. I am excited to bring the Word of God to us at Third Avenue Baptist Church. Let's go to the Lord one more time in prayer. Father, we pray that you would speak and help us to listen well. We ask this in Christ's name. Amen. did you know that sometimes pastors may get asked to do something pretty funny and strange let me give you an example there's a pastor who shared that there's a senior adult at his church call him and said pastor i have a mouse in my house please come get it and he lived 30 minutes away so he tried to contact all the members to come get it first no one was available so he had to drive 30 minutes there and spend over an hour to chase the mouse. I bet he had a good
illustration to use in the future, but here's my favorite story. Ready for this? A pastor, another pastor shared a story that he got a call from a member of his church and the lady said, pastor, my neighbor's sheep is out on the road and he said of course the lady expect me to come and help her because after all i was a shepherd so isn't it wild the things pastor may get asked to do so greg mike and brandon you shepherds watch out because you may get a call like that some days. But whether you are a pastor or not, if you are a Christian, there is always one thing that you will be asked to do. Someone, somewhere, at some point in time will ask you to pray.
They will ask you to pray. Now, there are many kinds of prayers, but the kind of prayers that I want us to focus on this evening is intercessory prayers. Prayers for non-Christians. Prayers for unbelievers. If I hand out a piece of paper to each one of us right now and ask you to write the names of those you would like the Lord to save, I would be shocked to receive back to me a blank piece of paper. Because the truth is, as those who know the Lord Jesus, as those who have repented of our sins and put our faith in the Lord Jesus, we want those who do not know him to come to faith. We want them to be saved, don't we? And they could be our family members, our friends, our co-workers, our students, our clients, you name it, whether who they are if they don't know the Lord, we as Christians want them to come to know him. So what do intercessory prayers
on their behalf look like? I invite you to turn with me to Genesis chapter 18. It is on page 13 on your Pew Bible. Genesis chapter 18. We will focus our attention on verse 32, but for context, I will be reading verses 22 and 23, and then 32 to 33. So 22 and 23, 32 and 33.
Genesis chapter 18, verse 22. So the man, that is the two angels, turned from there and went towards Sodom. But Abraham stood before the Lord. Then Abraham drew near and said, Will you indeed sweep away the righteous with the wicked? Skip down to verse 32. Then he said, Oh, let not the Lord be angry, and I will speak again, but this once.
Suppose ten are found there. He answered, For the sake of ten, I will not destroy it. And the Lord went his way when he had finished speaking to Abraham. And Abraham returned to his place. There are two elements of intercessory prayers that I want to highlight for us from this verse. So two aspects of intercessory prayers.
First of all, intercessory prayers are persistent prayers. And secondly, intercessory prayers are confident prayers. Persistence and confidence. So let's look at the first point. Intercessory prayers are persistent prayer. What is the first word that you see in verse 32? Then. That's the first word. And that tells us that we are dropping into the middle, or really the end of a conversation between Abraham and God.
And half of chapter 18 is about Abraham's interceding for the wicked city of Sodom and Gomorrah. And so he began by asking, and the question that dominated Abraham's mind is this, will the judge of all the earth do what is right? And Abraham went on to answer his own question, Far be it from you, Lord, to do such a thing. And then what happened after that is that Abraham kept bringing, giving God a number of hypothetical scenarios.
And he said, suppose, Lord, there are 50 righteous people. Will you destroy the city? And God said, for the sake of the 50, I will not do it. And then Abraham said, how about five less than 50, Lord? And God said, hmm, you mean 45, eh? Right? For 50 minus five, God can do math. For the sake of 45, I will not do it. And then Abraham just keep bringing the number lower and lower and lower every time. So he went from 50 to 45 to 40 to 30 to 20.
And then look again in our verse, verse 32. Then he said, Oh, let not the Lord be angry, and I will speak but this one. Suppose, how many? Ten are found there. Suppose ten are found there. This would have been the six times Abraham went back and forth with God. Fifty, forty-five, forty, thirty, twenty, tens. You see, intercessory prayers are persistent.
They are relentless. They are steady. They are like the waves in the ocean that keeps coming into the seashore. Sometimes it may be high. Other times it may be low. Sometimes it comes really fast. Other times it comes pretty slow. Sometimes they look really strong. Other times they appear weak. But they keep coming. And that's what Abraham did. He kept coming to the Lord. Lord, how about 45? Lord, how about 40?
Lord, how about 30, 20, and 10? Lord, please save them. Intercessory prayers are persistent prayer. But why don't we pray? Why don't we intercede persistently? We have a hint in our verse. Look again with me in verse 32. What was the first thing that Abraham said? He said, oh, let not the Lord be, be what?
Be angry? Oh, let not the Lord be angry, and I will speak again, but this one. So maybe one reason why we don't pray persistently is because we think God may be angry, as our request, as our repeated request. He may cut us off. He may decide one day, that's enough. I don't want to listen anymore. Maybe that was on Abraham's mind. He's afraid that the Lord may be angry.
And I'm sure we have been to some places where you see a bell and then there's a sign that says ring bell for service. The first few times, imagine if you come back there every day. The first few times you hit the bell very confidently and then as times go by you start to think maybe I'm bothering this person or maybe he may get mad at me. And so you start to ring the bell lower and lower until you just stand there and don't ring the bell.
Lord, let the Lord not be angry. So maybe that was Abraham's fear. And that is also our fear. But it is far from the truth because the Lord said, he wants to come our prayer. He loves our prayer. He delights in our prayer. And he wants the lost to be saved. He wants them to come to faith and find forgiveness in the Lord Jesus. He said, I take no delight in the death of the wicked. He wants them to come to faith.
So brothers and sisters, pray, intercede for the lost persistently. That's our first point. Let's look at our second point. Intercessory prayers are confident prayers. They are confident prayers. Have you ever wondered why Abraham stopped at number 10? Why not 11? Maybe he doesn't like Clay Thompson. I don't know. But why not 5?
Now, some people say, oh, maybe he's thinking about Lot's family. So you have Lot, his wife, his two daughters, maybe his two son-in-law, but they don't really add up to 10, so why 10? It's not totally clear, and the text doesn't really tell us, but I do have a guess. Remember, this is the sixth time Abraham went back and forth with the Lord. Lord, how about 50, 45, 30, 20, 10? No, let's give one number.
I don't know, my checkbook never balanced. So, six times he went back and forth to the Lord. And I think by this time, Abraham has learned. Remember the question that dominates his mind? Will the church of all the earth do what is right? I think by this time, Abraham must have decided that, you know what? The Lord will do what is right. Whatever happened to Sodom and Gomorrah, whatever he ordained, he will do what is right.
And I trust him. And so by that point, the numbers become insignificant to him. Abraham can walk away knowing that God will do what is right. In fact, if you look at verse 32, take a quick look at verse 32. And the Lord went his way when he had finished speaking to Abraham, and Abraham returned to his place. So the Lord left, and Abraham also left.
And he left, he didn't try to take hold of the Lord and try to intercede anymore because he knew that whatever the Lord will do to Sodom and Gomorrah, he will do what is right. And Abraham said, I will trust him. I will trust his justice. Sometimes, but sometimes we do lack this kind of confidence when we pray, don't we? When we pray for the lost among us, we keep asking the Lord to save them. And then after the amen, what do we do?
Sometimes we say, but what if? What if they don't come to faith? What if they don't repent? What if they don't believe? What if and what if? But then we forgot. Whatever happened, the Lord will do what is right. We need to trust in his justice. He will do what is right. And we can trust him. So, yes, pray for them. Share the gospel with them, but be like the soldier. Trust that God's word will not return to him void, but will accomplish his purpose.
So trust him. So what have we learned so far about intercessory prayers? They are persistent prayers, and they are confident prayers. If you are here and you are not a Christian, this is our prayer for you, that the Lord would open your eyes so that you would see your need for Jesus. That even though we are all sinners, God in his great mercy has sent his one and only son to die the death that we deserve and to live the life that we must live, should have lived, and rose again on the third day.
And he said, if you come to me, repent of your sin, I will forgive you and make you cleanse, clean. So intercessory prayers are confident. They are persistent. George Muller is perhaps well-known for his prayer life. The story is told of how he prayed for five of his non-Christian friends. After five years, the Lord saved the first one. After 10 years, the Lord saved the next two.
After 25 years, the Lord saved the fourth one. And a few months after Mueller's death, the Lord saved the last one. And that would have been a total of 52 years. 52 years. Mueller prayed persistently and confidently. And even though he died, the prayer lives because it was offered to a living God and the Lord seeked to answer it. So what a model of persistent and confident prayer.
So let us, brothers and sisters, pray confidently and persistently for the lost among us. Would you join me in prayer? Father, we pray for our families and loved ones, co-workers and friends, teachers, mentors, your students, those among us who do not know you. We pray for the children you have given us as third. We pray that you would save them for our joy and for your glory. And we ask all of this in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.