00:00:01 This is a passage that has two people\'s names getting changed, and I thought this is a great passage to reflect on as we are changing our name as a church. And this is the first time in the Bible that God actually meets someone and changes his name. But this is not the last time He does that. He keeps doing that with several more people as He keeps going. 00:00:32 We have already seen some portions of this text before, but today I wanted to bring a special word from this entire chapter, and I want to give you the three points we are going to talk about. For those of you who are new, I\'m a three-point preacher, always try to let you have three points that we can retain. So the title of my sermon is \"A New Name: The Unchanging God and His Unbreakable Covenant.\" And there are three things we are going to look at today. 00:01:07 So God gives Abraham a new name, and this is what He communicates. The first point is that God does extraordinary things through ordinary people. God does extraordinary things through ordinary people. Secondly, this passage also reveals how our God is an unchanging God. So the second point I want us to walk away with is knowing God reveals His extraordinary nature through ordinary means. 00:01:38 And thirdly, this passage also has the word covenant repeated multiple times, and that\'s part of the core of what we believe. Creed is actually a short form of covenant and reformed, the C from the covenant and R-E and E-D from reformed. And this is one of the places which has the strongest descriptions of God\'s covenant. God loves broken people through his unbreakable covenant. Those are the three things we are going to look at. 00:02:09 God does extraordinary things through ordinary people, God reveals his extraordinary nature through ordinary means, and God loves broken people through his unbreakable covenant. So let\'s start with the new name. This passage begins by talking to us about a person called Abraham. Now, who is this Abraham? Abraham, or Abraham, as he is known, is a major historical figure, not just in the Bible, but also in world history. Three out of the six major world religions trace their origins to him. 00:02:50 And right now in the world, you look at it, it\'s close to 4 billion people, more than 54% of the human population, people trace their origins. So he\'s a very important person in history, whether you like it or not. And where was he from? The Bible tells us, and even other historic sources verify it, he\'s from a city called Ur, in a place called Mesopotamia. And the events of this happened around 4,000 years before, like 2000 BC. Ur, in those days, was a tremendous city. 00:03:28 You could call that as the Silicon Valley of Mesopotamia. It was a happening city and a very significant city. And Abraham and his family were part of that city, and Abraham got his name from his father. His father\'s name was Terah, and he gave Abraham the name because as all fathers, he names his son with the desire that all fathers have. I\'m sure those of you, we just had a baby that was baptized, and several babies are coming forward. I\'m excited. I can\'t wait to hear their names. 00:04:11 And some of you parents are already thinking of how to name and what to name. And usually, as parents, you want to give your child a name that reflects something flourishing, beautiful. Like if you even take some famous people. I\'m always impressed with how Martin Luther King Jr. was named. Think of that. He got Martin, Luther, and King combined together. Beat that, right? My own sister\'s middle name is Princess. I didn\'t get a name like Prince or King. My mom\'s here. 00:04:45 I need to ask her why she never thought about that. And so Abraham, the name Abraham, means an exalted father. Back in those days, if you want your family to flourish, you want them to have children. So Abraham\'s father Terah\'s desire was that Abraham will be a father like him. And he had three sons. He wanted him to have children, except there was only one problem. Abraham and his wife Sarai did not have any children. And that\'s when God meets Abraham. And He meets him in three places. 00:05:25 We read in Genesis 12, Genesis 15, Genesis 17. He tells him even when he is in Ur that He has an extraordinary plan and purpose for Abraham\'s life, which is to multiply him greatly. That\'s hard to believe when you are that old, isn\'t it? And Abraham\'s response, even as he\'s journeyed, so He tells him to go to this different country, leave his familiar place and family and move, and He meets him again. 00:06:00 And when God tells him in this chapter 17, verse 17, if you read, it says, \"Abraham, he fell on his face and laughed and said to himself, \'Shall a child be born to a man who is a hundred years old?\" It\'s a very legit question. It\'s a very reasonable question too, isn\'t it? I was imagining, he\'s not very different, Abraham, from people who live in today\'s modern world, especially in Silicon Valley. Now, perhaps he\'s a rationalist. We believe in reason, isn\'t it? 00:06:36 Unless things make reason or sense, we can\'t put our faith in it. So Abraham, most of us, you\'re all engineers, you need reason, you need data, you need logic if something has to be true. Sounds very Silicon Valley-ish to me. Perhaps that\'s what he did. And you ask, how can we believe that God exists? Or perhaps you\'re asking the question, why is it that only the God of the Bible is true? Why does it have to be so exclusive? Sounds so exclusive, isn\'t it? 00:07:12 So he goes about, he wants to believe this, but he also tries to figure things out himself as how most of us do. And not just him, his wife is even more convinced it\'s not going to happen. How can you get pregnant when you\'re close to 100 years? And so she does the unthinkable. She asks Abraham to have a surrogate child through a surrogate mother who was working in their house. And Abraham thinks that\'s a smart move and goes for it. 00:07:49 This is what happens when your whole life, you\'re pursuing a dream. That\'s the dream that was given to you by your parents or by others in the world around you, and then it doesn\'t happen. Our default response is for our strength to kick in and somehow try to make that happen, isn\'t it? It\'s a very remarkable thing in Silicon Valley. Life can be so tiring sometimes because it promises great wealth, power, and happiness. 00:08:29 Most of us who live here, in some form or fashion, we are creating and consuming technology that changes human life. And historically, sociologists tell us we have moved from what was an oral age in the time of Abraham, that\'s how people communicated, to the age of printing in 16th, 17th century when Johannes Gutenberg invented the printing machine, and to the age of TV and radio in the early 30s to 50s of this century. 00:09:06 And then the time of transformation of civilizations kept getting shorter and shorter, and sociologists tell us in Y2K, we moved to a digital age with the arrival of computers and the birth and emergence of Silicon Valley, which has brought people like us. And now we are being told there\'s another seismic shift happening with the advent of artificial intelligence, and no one knows what that world is going to look like. But every technological breakthrough promises the same thing. 00:09:41 It promises the same things. It says, \"With this, your life\'s going to be amazing. You\'re going to have more wealth, more power, and more pleasure from what you earn and do.\" Murray Jordan has written this amazing book, \"The Making and Unmaking of a Technological Society.\" If you guys have a chance, you should grab it and read it. And he says every technological endeavor always promise that you\'re going to work less and life will be better. 00:10:13 Yet, work weeks which were supposed to be cut in half have only kept getting doubled, isn\'t it? You work more hours. You can\'t take vacations, though you have unlimited PTO, sounds so nice, but how many of you have the courage to go and ask your boss, \"Can I take my unlimited PTOs for three months and go on a cruise in Europe and visit my family in Asia and then chill on the beach?\" By the time you come back, your unlimited PTO would have morphed to something else. 00:10:48 You would have had to find a new job or a new company, isn\'t it? But that\'s the promise. Hey, AI is going to do all the work for you. You can just push the button, sit, and chill. Wow. And so you feel stuck. God knew that Abraham didn\'t just need a son to feel validated. He didn\'t just need a son to live his life. He needed God. He needed a new purpose that\'s bigger than that, and that\'s something he could not do, and that\'s something only God could do for him. 00:11:26 So God says, \"Abraham, it\'s about time you believe in me, so I\'m going to change your name. I\'m going to change your name. You haven\'t fully believed in me, Abraham. You believe me, but then you go and do all these things by your own effort. I\'m going to change your name from Abraham to Abraham.\" It\'s just a couple of vowels, but it seismically shifts the meaning of a father, an exalted father, to a father of many nations. 00:11:54 Imagine Abraham going back and telling his servants when he still has no children and 99 years old, \"God gave me a new name, and it\'s Abraham. I\'m going to be a father of many nations.\" They would have laughed at him, isn\'t it? But God gives him that name first so Abraham can be reminded and believe in God. Because God named him not according to what he saw Abraham has. He was just an ordinary guy, isn\'t it? God named him according to what he had promised him to make of him. 00:12:34 And that\'s what the next few verses explain. Perhaps you are tired of pursuing a purpose that was sold to you by Silicon Valley. Again, Silicon Valley, which is one of the least religious places in the world, it doesn\'t matter what your religion is, Hinduism or Buddhism or Christianity or Islam or Jainism, work is worship, isn\'t it? Or school is worship. Reason is revered. Technology is the functional god, because that\'s where we put our faith in. 00:13:10 While work is worshipped on the weekdays, you know what gets worshipped on the weekends? I got to see this when I was coaching my son\'s baseball team. Sports is worshipped on the weekends, and you go sit in those little league matches. I saw people way more excited on the stands than I\'ve ever seen in our church. So wow, this is their church. Tailgating before games was authentic community happening there. The world around us tells us to create our identity through achievement. 00:13:48 It goes even with how people introduce yourself. How would you go and introduce yourself? You walk into a party at work or in someone\'s house. How do people come and introduce themselves? People, they usually introduce yourself. The first question guys ask is, \"Hey, what do you do? Where do you work?\" Right? Or which company. Is it the Big Five? Is it this? Is it that? 00:14:07 Or people introduce themselves through their degrees or where they live, or their children and their children\'s accomplishments. But what we don\'t realize is every achieved identity is fragile and can be lost like that. But here, the gospel, the good news, it offers an identity that we can receive from God rather than constructed through our performance and self-efforts. And the world always names you according to what you have accomplished. 00:14:41 Your failures name you according to what you have done or not done. But grace of God names you according to what God has promised to make you, and that\'s what God promises. He promises to each one of you individually that he can take your ordinary life and make something extraordinary. Perhaps you have many questions about God, and like Abraham, it\'s totally okay to ask God those questions. I had questions when I was a teenager. I lost my father at the age of 15. My mother, she\'s here. 00:15:22 She raised us as a single mom, and she\'s been a widow for the past 37 years. That life is not easy. And I had more anger than questions, and I stopped believing in the existence of God. But God did not let me in those ways, in those moments. Just like how God intervened in Abraham\'s life, he did in mine, too. God\'s answer to Abraham\'s question was a new name with a new identity and a new purpose. 00:15:59 And all Abraham had to do was to believe, knowing that he had no ability in himself to do what he desired or what God desired. His reasonable actions led to disasters. That\'s what happens when we try to use our human reason, and historically, it produces more evil than good. And again, Murray Jordan talks about this. He has this beautiful line, says how technology can be ambiguous. It can create tremendous good, but it can also create tremendous evil. 00:16:35 Bows and arrows can only kill a few people, but now drones can remotely kill a lot more who are a lot farther away. Isn\'t it? Abraham needed to come to a place to know that he cannot do anything, and his smallest actions were not sufficient before God, and accept his new name. And that\'s God\'s desire for all of us. When we go to Him with our questions, He answers us by giving us a new name. The Bible calls that as being born again, and it\'s new birth. 00:17:10 When we genuinely reach out to God, He gives us a new name and a new purpose, too. And he did eventually believe. In Galatians, we say that Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness. That sparked the Reformation. It changed the world. His new mission was that he will be a father of many nations, and God will do something amazing through his offspring. 00:17:37 Verse 8 he says, \"And I will give to you and to your offspring after you the land of your sojournings, all the land of Canaan for an everlasting position, and I will be their God.\" God was going to give an offspring to Abraham. It doesn\'t say offsprings, children, but offspring, because it was pointing to someone who was going to come 4,000 years nearly later, 2,000 years later. And this offspring was literally going to change the world in a way that Abraham could have not even imagined. 00:18:14 His son was born. His name was Isaac, and Abraham now believed in this God, and he lived up to his name, even when God was testing him to let go of his son And Abraham had many more descendants, and sadly, many of them had to have change, not in their hearts and their names. His grandson Jacob\'s name had to be changed to Israel. And the history continues until it came to Jesus, who is an offspring of Abraham. 00:18:54 Jesus came into this world to bring healing, to bring redemption, to bring restoration. And Jesus said that Abraham saw his day and he was glad. Do you have such a vision for your children, 10 generations, 20 generations from now? What your dream is for them, especially in this new country? God chose a wandering, childless, skeptical, aging, 99-year-old Aramian to be the father of many nations. If God can do that to an ordinary person like Abraham, he can do even more in your life and my life. 00:19:44 He wants to give each one of us a new name, a new identity, a new purpose. So are you ready? Take your questions to him. Be honest with him. Are you stuck? Are you lonely? Are you still trying to live your life with your own strength? You don\'t have to. You can ask God. Secondly, we see that God reveals his extraordinary nature through ordinary means because he\'s an unchanging God. You and I, we cannot know God unless God chooses to reveal himself. 00:20:17 It\'s like when you go into a party and you meet someone and you can say, \"Hi, and how are you?\" And have a pep talk. But really, unless the other person chooses to tell you more, you cannot really find out, isn\'t it? Your ability to know one another depends on the ability of the other person\'s willingness to reveal himself or herself to you. So God, when we start in these very first verses, he reveals who he is to Abraham. 00:20:47 It\'s one of the first few passages in the Bible where God self-discloses himself. He tells to Abraham, his name is El Shaddai. The meaning of that is, \"I am God Almighty.\" El, some commentators and historians say, though it\'s not absolutely confirmed, that El was a common name people in those cultures used to describe God. And in many of those cultures, in some of the Oriental primitive cultures, people tended to make things that they were afraid of as a god, like the Greeks, for example. 00:21:32 They were afraid of thunder, so they created the god of thunder. They were afraid of the ocean, so they created the god of the ocean. And you can see that. But here, the same thing was happening in this world, and so the name that people used was El. So God chose a name that was slightly familiar to him, but he also tells him more by way of revealing who he is by saying that he is an almighty God, a powerful God. What that means is he\'s a God who can make the impossible possible. 00:22:06 When Abraham thinks it\'s impossible to have children at 99, and it\'s true, God says, \"Let me show you who I am, Abraham. I am El Shaddai.\" He reveals himself in a very personal way, and he\'s doing the same even today. He has revealed himself now way more than just wanting and waiting for a personal encounter. He has given us his word. All his words in the Bible can tell us who God is. The Bible as a collection of God\'s acts in human history. 00:22:42 It lists not just the names that God has used of himself. God reveals himself through how he has acted in human history, too, in changing people\'s lives, like Abraham\'s. God met me through a friend in college whose life was so beautiful, and I began to reread the Bible, and God started revealing himself to me, too. I read the Bible before, but I had never understood that. But now, God graciously opened my eyes to discover him myself. 00:23:18 And he has been real in my life through all the ups and downs and in every one of your lives as well. Knowing God is one of the most beautiful exercises. The Westminster Shorter Catechism, the first question asks this question: What is the chief end of man? And the answer is the chief... Let me see if our children remember this. What is the chief end of man? The chief end of man is? To glorify God. To glorify God. And enjoy him forever. There is real enjoyment, isn\'t it? 00:23:55 I\'m still learning and discovering God, and it\'s available easily for us. You don\'t have to go to a seminary to read and understand, but you can be part of a community like Creed Church. And as you talk to people around, you will hear stories like mine of transformed lives. People in small groups can share more of how God has been real to them. In Lake Tahoe, when we had our church retreat, we heard the journey of two young men in our church and how God changed their lives over years. 00:24:33 And he continues to do that through simple means. We call it the ordinary means of grace that\'s available to every single one of us. You and I can discover this extraordinary God. We don\'t have to go to a mountaintop and meditate, or we don\'t have to go to some place and hurt ourself and become mystics, and that this is only secretly revealed to some few super religious people. God says, \"I can come and reveal myself to you. I have given you the Bible, which tells you who I am. 00:25:05 All you got to do is just take it, read it with a friend.\" And if you have a friend, perhaps who has invited you here, ask them what their story is. They would love to tell you their story. And perhaps even I would encourage you if you can ask them if you can read the Bible together with them. And the passage to open and read would be the Sermon on the Mount. It\'s just three short chapters in the Bible. This is the good news of the Bible that Jesus shared in a condensed way. 00:25:33 And you will see, and I will challenge you, your life will never be the same after that. And lastly, we\'re going to look at the third point. God loves broken people through his unbreakable covenant. One thing God tells Abraham when he meets him is this: \"I am God Almighty.\" And then he says, \"Walk before me and be blameless.\" Wow. Now, God\'s ask is very high. The word blameless can be translated as integrated. When it\'s applied to God, it talks of how God is perfect. 00:26:15 God is the only one in whom all of his attributes are in perfect harmony. To simplify it, what it means is it says you walk the talk. You walk the talk consistently at home, work, in your thought life, in your actions with your spouse. This Sermon on the Mount, when you read it, you will see that Jesus constantly uses this phrase, \"You have heard it said, but I tell you.\" What he was doing was taking all the things the religious people said. 00:26:53 All religious people in all religions, no matter what religion you belong to, tell you a list of things you have to do. But really, do they actually do it? And will they be able to do what God expects, is the question. So Jesus reinterprets all religions at the same time, which tell everybody, \"Hey, be good.\" He moves to the heart, which cannot be seen. Maybe it\'s easy for you, perhaps, to give money to poor people sometimes who are asking for money on the freeway exits with a sign. 00:27:35 Maybe you give them 20 bucks or buy them coffee or food. I do that when I see someone. I go to Phil\'s and sometimes people are there. It actually doesn\'t hurt me to do that. It\'s easy. I\'m moved with compassion, buy them that, or hold a door for a stranger in an elevator or your room. You know what\'s hard for me? When I go back home after a long, tiring day, and my wife tells me to go buy milk from the grocery store, and she doesn\'t get my compassionate self at that time. 00:28:10 The face she sees there is not the face you want to see, too. Or someone else in your workplace, for that matter, right? It\'s hard, isn\'t it? Or maybe you\'re married and you\'re living faithfully with your wife, but in your mind, perhaps, you\'re fantasizing about that person you saw in your workplace or outside or online, maybe even. You\'re not then walking the talk. That\'s what Jesus says is a disintegrated heart. Because as you know, this famous formula I keep saying, God\'s bar is high. 00:28:48 100% of me and you should meet 100% of God\'s perfect standards 100% of the time. Impossible, isn\'t it? Abraham knew this. Verse three says, \"Then Abraham fell on his face, crying out he can\'t.\" And that\'s when God said to him, verse four, \"Behold, my covenant is with you, and you shall be the father of a multitude of nations.\" Abraham knew he just could not do it. In a sense, he had sort of committed adultery by embracing this surrogacy, isn\'t it? So God says, \"I know you can\'t, Abraham. 00:29:30 I know you\'re broken. I know no human being can come to me, so I\'m going to make this covenant, and my covenant is unbreakable.\" So he asks him to do something, and he gives him a sign of circumcision, which is a very painful thing to do when you\'re 99 years old, but it involves a piece of your flesh being taken away and blood being shed. And in the Old Testament, the circumcision was a sign of cleansing, and God repeatedly says that he wants us to be holy. 00:30:05 And it also communicates God\'s judgment on sin because it involves the tearing of flesh and the shedding of blood. And this was to remind Abraham that that\'s the cost. And there was also a curse. He says, \"If anyone is not circumcised, he shall be cut off from my presence.\" That is, if you\'re not believing, who can do this? 00:30:41 Only someone who knows he\'s not perfect, and he can never walk the talk all the time, and knows that there is a consequence for his actions, even the ones that are invisible and nobody can see. If you\'re being honest, and you stand before a holy God, and you can see that, who can know all of that, only that person would be able to do. And Abraham does this, we see immediately in the last verses. He immediately takes his child and everyone and does what God asks him to do. 00:31:11 Because that\'s the sign God tells them for what they need to do. But what happened after Abraham? Did his offspring walk blameless? We know they did not. Jacob and his nation of Israelites, they constantly broke the covenant. And they were fit for the curse of being cut off. That\'s covenant curse language. And if we are honest, that applies to you and I, isn\'t it? Who among us can say we have walked perfectly before God? Who here can say we are truly blameless? 00:31:50 Who can say we have loved God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength? We all have failed to do that. But here is the glory of the good news of the gospel. An offspring did come, and that was Jesus Christ. He was not just a son of Abraham, not just a son of David, but the true and better son. He took the offspring, Jesus, who was also circumcised on the eighth day and baptized, but his circumcision, the tearing of his flesh and shedding of his blood, was not that. 00:32:21 It was something that happened on the cross for all the failings of all of Abraham\'s descendants, including you and me. And people from all nations call Abraham as their father, isn\'t it? Abraham, the famous song, Abraham had many sons. I am one of them, and so are you, and we all failed. And Isaiah says this about Jesus. Instead of you and I being cut off, he says Jesus was cut off from the land of the living. The language of Genesis 17 falls on him. 00:32:55 Jesus was cut off so you and I could be brought in. Circumcision pointed to judgment, and Christ bore the judgment for all of us. Circumcision pointed to cleansing, and Christ\'s blood cleanses us, and that\'s what we do when we take part in this communion. Circumcision marked belonging to a covenant community, and Christ secures everlasting belonging. The knife that should have fallen on us fell on him, and that is covenant grace. Friends, today our church receives a new name. 00:33:28 But a new sign outside the building cannot renew the hearts of people inside the building. Only Jesus can do that. Creed is not a claim that we have arrived. It is a confession that we belong to a God who keeps His covenant, who saves sinners through Jesus Christ, and who gathers the people from every nation on planet Earth. So as I conclude, let me say this. Perhaps you came in today with questions. Perhaps you believe Christianity is unreasonable. 00:34:04 Perhaps you have succeeded professionally but remain exhausted or lonely, or guilty or unsure who you are. Perhaps you\'ve been trying to make your life work through your own strength. Abraham could not produce the future God promised. Neither can we produce the life with God for which we were created. We cannot perform our way into God\'s family, reason our way out of guilt, or achieve our way beyond death. 00:34:35 But God has done for us what we could never do for ourselves, and that\'s the good news, friends. The promised offspring of Abraham has come. Jesus lived the blameless life we have not lived. He was cut off under God\'s judgment so that people like us could be brought in and made family. He rose from death and now offers forgiveness, reconciliation, and everlasting belonging. 00:35:01 Becoming a Christian, adopting a new name, the new name he gives for everyone who embraces him is Christian or someone who belongs to Christ. It\'s not merely adopting a religious label or joining a church. In Christ, you can be forgiven, welcomed, and be called a child of God. As we receive a new name as a church, the greater question I have for you is: will you receive the new life that only Jesus can give? So come to this Jesus, my dear friends. 00:35:37 He will give you also a new name, the name of His own Son, who is God, Jesus Christ Himself. He will give you a new purpose in life. Says Abraham believed and did what God asked him to do, and He will do the same when you embrace this new name, this new life, this new identity, and new purpose. God can use you to bring healing to a broken world. His love will never fail you.