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When Abraham’s Altar Became Jacob’s Well
Genesis 12:5-7 (KJV)
5 And Abram took Sarai his wife, and Lot his brother’s son, and all their substance that they had gathered, and the souls that they had gotten in Haran; and they went forth to go into the land of Canaan; and into the land of Canaan they came. 6 And Abram passed through the land unto the place of Sichem, unto the plain of Moreh. And the Canaanite was then in the land. 7 And the LORD appeared unto Abram, and said, Unto thy seed will I give this land: and there builded he an altar unto the LORD, who appeared unto him.
Isaiah 12:1-3 (KJV)
1 And in that day thou shalt say, O LORD, I will praise thee: though thou wast angry with me, thine anger is turned away, and thou comfortedst me. 2 Behold, God is my salvation; I will trust, and not be afraid: for the LORD JEHOVAH is my strength and my song; he also is become my salvation. 3 Therefore with joy shall ye draw water out of the wells of salvation.
· God began to move upon Abraham’s heart, and promised him that if he would leave his homeland, given to idol worship, that he would give him a new land, and make him great nation.
· Aren’t you glad that God has called us out of what we use to be, and given us a new place to dwell?
· As Abraham began to enter the land that the Lord was going to give him, he came to Sichem (Also called and Sychar).
· It was at Sichem that God confirmed his promise to Abraham, and there Abraham built an altar.
· Altars:
o Are a place of death
o A place of sacrifice
· Some how modern religion has turned the altars of our churches into places of blessings.
· No where in the Bible will you find that anyone was ever blessed at an altar, until something was first killed and sacrificed to God upon that same altar.
· An altar is a place of death and sacrifice, but on the other hand a well is the exact opposite.
· An altar takes life, but a well gives life.
· After Abraham built this altar, his place of death, he went on to obtain his promise.
· Sichem isn’t mentioned in the life of Isaac, and I will show you why later.
· But Sichem was mentioned in the life of his son, Jacob. For in Genesis 33:18 we are told that Jacob came to Sichem and there he built another altar.
· The practice of building altars was passed down from generation to generation.
· Our children need to be taught many things, but the most important thing that a child can be taught is how to build an altar (pray).
· But it doesn’t stop there. Joseph, who was Jacob’s son, asked that even though he was second in command of all of Egypt he wanted to be buried in the land of his father’s.
Joshua 24:32 (KJV)
32 And the bones of Joseph, which the children of Israel brought up out of Egypt, buried they in Shechem, in a parcel of ground which Jacob bought of the sons of Hamor the father of Shechem for an hundred pieces of silver: and it became the inheritance of the children of Joseph.
· I could preach another message right here – When you inherit an altar.
· Why would anyone want to inherit, and dirty, bloody, altar that is infested with the stench of death?
· Because Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph knew that God is divinely attracted to altars!
· There is something about an altar that God will not stay away from.
· He’s not impressed with our temples and our sanctuaries made with the finest materials, or the size of our congregations.
· He’s just looking for someone to begin to heap one dirty stone upon another dirty stone, (one dirty part of their life, upon another dirty part of their life) until they have erected an altar in their life, Then will God break forth and do things in their life that they never dreamed could be done!
· After Joseph’s life, Shechem or Sychar is mentioned much in the Old Testament.
· But I do want to share with you the scripture that mentions Sychar. This takes place thousands of years later, after all but a few have forgotten about Abraham’s altar in Sychar.
John 4:1-6 (KJV)
1 When therefore the Lord knew how the Pharisees had heard that Jesus made and baptized more disciples than John, 2 (Though Jesus himself baptized not, but his disciples,) 3 He left Judaea, and departed again into Galilee.
4 And he must needs go through Samaria.
· The disciples did not understand it, but Jesus was letting them know, I have an appointment in Sychar that has been thousands of years in the making.
5 Then cometh he to a city of Samaria, which is called Sychar, near to the parcel of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph. 6 Now Jacob’s well was there.
· Over a course of thousands of years, God had been doing something in Sychar that nobody had known about.
· God has transformed their altars into wells!
John 4:13-14 (KJV)
13 Jesus answered and said unto her, Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst again: 14 But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life.
· If you want a well, you need to build an altar!
· In the Tabernacle the two most important pieces of furniture were the altar and the Ark of the Covenant.
· The Altar represented sacrifice and death. The Ark represented the power and presence of God.
· The dimensions of the two were as such: The Altar was large enough that the Ark could be placed inside of it.
· God’s plan was that the Altar was to be bigger than the Ark.
· What we have tried to do is build bigger Arks.
· What God wants us to build is not bigger Arks, but bigger altars!
· The bigger your altar, the bigger Ark you can contain!
Ezekiel 47:1-5 (KJV)
1 Afterward he brought me again unto the door of the house; and, behold, waters issued out from under the threshold of the house eastward: for the forefront of the house stood toward the east, and the waters came down from under from the right side of the house, at the south side of the altar. 2 Then brought he me out of the way of the gate northward, and led me about the way without unto the utter gate by the way that looketh eastward; and, behold, there ran out waters on the right side. 3 And when the man that had the line in his hand went forth eastward, he measured a thousand cubits, and he brought me through the waters; the waters were to the ankles. 4 Again he measured a thousand, and brought me through the waters; the waters were to the knees. Again he measured a thousand, and brought me through; the waters were to the loins. 5 Afterward he measured a thousand; and it was a river that I could not pass over: for the waters were risen, waters to swim in, a river that could not be passed over.
· It’s a matter of progression! The depth of your repentance determines the height of your Revival.
· Now I want to show you why Isaac was left out of the Sychar deal.
· Isaac was the chosen son of Abraham. (Not Ishmael)
· God said for my chosen one, I’m going to use you to illustrate a different point. (You’re my Chosen!)
Genesis 26:19 And Isaac’s servants digged in the valley, and found there a well of springing water.
20 And the herdmen of Gerar did strive with Isaac’s herdmen, saying, The water is ours: and he called the name of the well Esek; because they strove with him.
· Esek – Quarrel
21 And they digged another well, and strove for that also: and he called the name of it Sitnah.
· Sitnah – Strife
22 And he removed from thence, and digged another well; and for that they strove not: and he called the name of it Rehoboth; and he said, For now the LORD hath made room for us, and we shall be fruitful in the land.
· Rehoboth – Broad places
· Three wells have been opened by God. Pentecost, Azusa, and the coming well.
· This is why God did what he did at Sychar.
· Here he was explaining to the disciples why he had done to the Samaritan woman.
John 4:35 (KJV)
35 Say not ye, There are yet four months, and then cometh harvest? behold, I say unto you, Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields; for they are white already to harvest.
· God is going to open this last well, our Rehoboth, so that we can harvest the lost souls of this world!
· God’s plan – You build an altar, I make it a well!
