Facing Death with Hope: Abraham, Burial, and Christ

Even if Abraham dies, he can die knowing that he has received a down payment on the promised land that God had given to him and his descendants. A down payment, of course, is the promise that there's more to come, that there will be more coming later. We give a down payment in the promise that we're gonna pay more later. God gives us a down payment on our life. The first down payment that he gives to us is the empty tomb. Jesus is alive, but there's more coming. Even though we may die, this is the down payment of our own resurrection and someday a promised new creation. That is the hope up ahead for you and I. [00:25:40] (54 seconds)  #DownPaymentHope

But the hope of the gospel is that though it's a fact that death is is present, that we must face it, it's not all there is. Jesus faced the reality of death for us. He experienced the reality of death for us. Jesus experienced all that we could possibly experience even to the point of death. We face the reality of death by remembering. We don't have to fix We don't have to have the answers for it because Jesus does. [00:11:06] (56 seconds)  #HopeThroughJesus

But yet scripture says, as we mentioned earlier from Hebrews, that Abraham died in faith, looking ahead to what was to come. And God's people, right, continued even after Abraham dying in faith until one day, a descendant of Abraham, Jesus, entered the grave and walked in. And there is our hope. The hero of our hope is Jesus. He is how we face the tragedy of death. A greater tragedy than death itself would be if we didn't remind each other and encourage each other to cling to this hope that we have. God has given us certainly everything we need to be able to to face death, not in fear and and torment, but in hope. So don't give up on hope. Both the hope that we have now and the hope that we have for what's to come. [00:27:47] (68 seconds)  #JesusHeroOfHope

This world is is not our home. We are not to behave in this world as the world does. We are to have faith even when it seems like God's promises are yet unfulfilled. We face death by remembering there is something better up ahead for us even though there are still things that we are waiting on because God loves us. Thirdly, we face death by believing in a secured future, a secured future. [00:18:21] (33 seconds)  #NotOurHome

Sometimes because of the injustice of the world, sometimes because of tragedy in the world, death being one of those, it may cause us to be tempted to give up our hope, maybe to to put our head in the sand and say, well, I'm just gonna ignore it. I'm not gonna deal with it. I'm not gonna look at it. I'm just gonna get away from It may cause us to say, well, how can God really fulfill his promises? How can God make good on the things that he has told us if there is the presence of so much tragedy, so much death? How can we face death? [00:03:24] (43 seconds)  #HopeNotAvoidance

So we see that death though is tempered by hope. Abraham has hope. He eventually is able to purchase the price. Ephraim agrees. And in this official kind of business transaction, he purchases the property and it permanently passes to Abraham and his descendants. This is his first permanent possession in the land, the first initial fulfillment of God's promise that Abraham will have all the land. Sometimes in life, it's important to have those those promises, those assurances that what we're hoping for is the real thing that we can count on. [00:21:15] (44 seconds)  #PromiseToPossession

So although Abraham, in this reality of death that he's facing, in this situation where God has made so many promises and he's beginning to see a little bit of it fulfilled, but there's so much more that's yet unfulfilled. Scripture tells us that Abraham looked ahead, that Abraham still exercised faith even though some of it was still unfulfilled because Abraham recognized there were better things ahead, that this place that he was a temporary resident in was not his home. [00:15:24] (36 seconds)  #FaithLookingAhead

We go on vacation. We go someplace wonderful and it's great. But if you're like me, if you're like us, we reach a point where we realize this is not home. We're temporarily in this place. We're certainly enjoying but this is not our home. There are better things awaiting us. There are so much as we may not wanna believe it in the moment, there are better things at home. This world that you and I find ourselves in, we are, as Abraham, soldiers, temporary residents. This world has a lot to be thankful for, a lot of good things to experience, but it is not our home. [00:16:09] (46 seconds)  #TemporaryResidents