1. Following God The Life of Abraham

2. Most of us dont receive nearly what God wants to give us. 3. Most None of us dont receive nearly what God wants to give us. 4. Jabez cried out to the God of Israel, Oh, that you would bless me and enlarge my territory! Let your hand be with me, and keep me from harm so that I will be free from pain. And God granted his request. 1 Chronicles 4:10 (NIV) 5. So far. . . #1 Abraham prioritized people over possessions. #2 Abraham dealt with stuff. #3 Abraham came up with a shrewd solution. #4 Abraham understood the concept of boundaries. #5 Abraham let others pick first. 6. Most of us dont receive nearly what God wants to give us. 7. Lot looked up and saw that the whole plain of the Jordan was well watered, like the garden of the LORD, like the land of Egypt, toward Zoar. 8. (This was before the LORD destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah.) So Lot chose for himself the whole plain of the Jordan and set out toward the east. 9. The two men parted company: Abram lived in the land of Canaan, while Lot lived among the cities of the plain and pitched his tents near Sodom. 10. Now the men of Sodom were wicked and were sinning greatly against the LORD. The LORD said to Abram after Lot had parted from him, 11. Lift up your eyes from where you are and look north and south, east and west. All the land that you see I will give to you and your offspring forever. 12. Lift up your eyes from where you are and look north and south, east and west. All the land that you see I will give to you and your offspring forever. 13. Lift up your eyes from where you are and look north and south, east and west. All the land that you see I will give to you and your offspring forever. 14. I will make your offspring like the dust of the earth, so that if anyone could count the dust, then your offspring could be counted. 15. Go, walk through the length and breadth of the land, for I am giving it to you. 16. So Abram moved his tents and went to live near the great trees of Mamre at Hebron, where he built an altar to the LORD. Genesis 13:10-18 (NIV) 17. Most of us dont receive nearly what God wants to give us. 18. But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. 19. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. 20. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, 21. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, 22. but that which is through faith in Christ--the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. 23. I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead. 24. Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. 25. Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. 26. Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: 27. Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, 28. I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. Philippians 3:7-14 (NIV) 29. Most of us dont receive nearly what God wants to give us. 30. We fail to believe. 31. We fail to believe. 32. We fail to believe. We fail to do. 33. Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. 34. Go, walk through the length and breadth of the land, for I am giving it to you. 35. Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me.