Pastor Samuel Sharing

Brother William Sharing

Do not criticize Abraham

Thank you for Brother William's sharing. The Doctrine of Destiny is very closely related to Genesis chapter 12. It starts with

The LORD had said to Abram, “Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you. “I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.”(Genesis 12:1-3 NIV)

If you understand typical Chinese or English, you will start reflecting on what the Lord said to Abram. How does it make you feel? Are these promises good? Do you want to be a rich man? I'm sure a lot of people aspire to be rich rather than being poor. However, it doesn't matter how much money you have, it cannot compare with the promises God granted to Abram in Genesis chapter 12:2-3.

After you have mulled over these two verses, you will surely know that this is something you desire. I don't think there is anybody who does not want this.

Can you imagine that He will make you into a great nation? And the Lord said He would bless you! He will make your name great! As you can see how important it is to have a great name. If you are somebody famous, or a well-known internet sensation, your name will certainly bring you a great deal of fortune and all associated benefits, you could almost print your own money. Therefore, it's crucially important to have a good name for yourself.

After having read chapter 12:2-3, a question came into my mind. Why did God speak to Abram? There is one particular question that to me is so meaningful that should get every one of us thinking.  What is so special about Abram that God spoke to him? We got to find out what kind of person he was.

If I were to be a person like him, God will also speak to me in the same manner. He will make me into a great nation, bless me, make my name great, make me to be a blessing and God will bless those who bless me, curse those who curse me. Here, I have substituted "you" with "me"! How amazing this is when all people on this earth will be blessed through me! When I read the Bible, I don't read for others, I read it for myself. You should also do the same!

Do you want this kind of thing to happen to you? I'm sure you do! Certainly, I want this to happen to me as this is exactly what I'm searching for. The question does not just stop here! If you want to have the same blessing as Abraham, you will need to find out what kind of person Abraham was and follow his footsteps, I am sure you will get it.

I can tell you that after following the footsteps of Abraham, I understood what Abraham did. He was a formidable person that we could never criticize, even if he did something you don't understand. For instance, a lot of people criticized him for how he treated his wife, lying to the Egyptians of their relationship. Some people may also say that if he was a man of faith, why would he go to Egypt? He should not be doing this, he should not be doing that. However, I don't! I want to encourage all of you to read the Bible in the manner of learning and following what he did.

He is the greatest person you could ever find in human history. He is not the one we could ever criticize. Even some philosophers lambasted Abraham for not acknowledging his wife, but lying that was his sister instead. For those who have condemned Abraham, they never understood that God bless those who bless Abraham, and God will curse those who curse Abraham. As you will see a lot of things happening around us.

Seeking the meaning of life

When I learnt about Abraham, I realized that he was an amazing person. He had a nephew called Lot, his brother Haran's son, who ended up leaving the place with Abraham for Cannan. It's very clear that they had a very close relationship. I believe that Abraham actually watched his brother dying and it came as a total shock to Abraham. As you can imagine how heartbroken Abraham was. He was almost broken.

We have learnt about a lot of people who died in the previous chapter from verse 10 to the end of the chapter. It records some people who lived a long life after having children. He saw that life and death are core human problems. People just come and go, leaving this world without anything.  Most importantly, what do you do after seeing life and death?  Will you search for the meaning of life? Very often people will say it's vanity and meaningless when we face challenges in life.

Nonetheless, Abraham is out seeking the meaning of life. The truth is whoever seeks the meaning of life has the possibility of finding God, but not for those who don't seem. Abraham felt the urge of looking for the meaning of life, the point of his existence in this world. Although he had a wealth of livestock, he was fully aware that he would not live forever. Therefore, he was seeking eternal life, a meaningful life!

Let me take you through and help you understand what Abraham was thinking. Abram later changed his name to become Abraham. I will call him Abraham in this chapter as this will be used throughout the rest of the book. Abraham left the country with all his belongings at the age of 75. What I want you to understand is what was in his mind.

A typical person at the age of 75, all in their mind is going to be retired, going to enjoy their life, and going to plan for retirement. This is how people live and how people think.  But, look at Abraham, Abraham was settled at a place, but he decided to leave his father, leave everything, and leave from the place which he's supposed to be settled down, Harran.  At Harran, he probably have a good property and have a good living environment, but then he took all his belonging, throw away all his property, and after that set off from Harran. It's an amazing decision. It's an amazing decision. Are you with me? Do you understand this?  Who are the people that can take a trouble like this?  What kind of people can look down all the suffering?  Moving from here to there, set out from Harran, and moving is in tough journey, right?

It is a tough journey. If you go back to Chapter 11, and you will see, “Terah took his son Abram, his grandson Lot son of Haran, and his daughter-in-law Sarai, the wife of his son Abram, and together they set up from Ur of the Chaldeans go to Canaan.” Are you with me? They want to go to Canaan.  But when they came to Harran, they settled there.

The father of the Abraham, Terah, they supposed to go to Canaan, and Terah doesn't want to go anymore, because it is a tough journey.  Who don’t want to live in a comfortable life? Who want to have a life that is full of trouble and facing a lot of challenges?  Who want to go to a place where you do not know any people and do not know their language? But this Abraham, he set up and move.  He took all his belongings and go.  He left his father, even his father does not want to go to that place, and he decided to go.

God like this kind of people. God will bless these kind of people.  Abraham actually looked down all the difficulties, he had never murmuring about the challenges, difficulties, and suffering.  And the problem is, Abraham went to this place, the place of Canaanites, and the Lord said, this is the place that I will give to you, I give this land to you.  Then, do you know what happened?  After God said he will give this land to Abraham, which is called Promised Land, then there was a famine in the land. Oh my God, is it the place that you want to give to me?  It is a place of famine, a place that is short of food and the famine was so severe.

Do not complain

However, Abraham is not the type of person who complain, he never complained.  If a person who have a bad habit of complaining, they will complain about the environment, complain about their father, complain about their brother, complain about their nephew, complain about the work, complain about the job, and complain about their boss.  Trust me, this type of person will not going to be blessed by God at all.

Abraham was never complaining and he was never murmuring. I would encourage you, if you want to be a person who mentioned in versus 2 and 3, you want God to make you into a great nation, want God to bless you, want God to make your name great, want God to make you to be a blessing, and God will bless those who bless you, curse those who curse you, and all the people on the earth will be blessed through you, then, you should learn a lesson, don't complain, do not complain. Through the type of people who complains a lot, their years in the past becomes a proven tracked record, you will find they are not blessed at all. I'm sure that you will find curse in them. Are you with me?

So, the Doctrine of Destiny comes into picture when we study Genesis chapter 12.  At Genesis chapter 12, Abraham is searching for the meaning of life, he is searching for the eternal life, he looked down all the suffering on the Earth, and that’s why God speak to him.  If you follow his steps, you will surely experience the faithful of God and the promise of almighty God.  Abraham is not complaining king, he never complain.  Then, you know what happened?  He went to a place that had a famine, then, because of famine, he planned to go to Egypt.

At that time, Egypt have no famine, and there will be a sufficient food.  Abraham is really a marvelous person, I have plenty of things to learn from him.  Even today, there are so many things I need to learn from Abraham.  He is a very amazing person, that's why God bless him. God bless him, God make his name great.  For a typical person who came to a place where it’s given by God, or after starting a job, and starts complaining the boss, complaining the environment, complaining the pay, or complaining the projects, if you think the job is so boring, you are a boring person.

Do you want to be a boring person or do you want to be a person who enjoy a boring job?  That is something very, very different.  Just like what William said, he looked for job, he prayed to God and ask God to give him a job.  Then, God gave him the job, and he started to complain.  Now, do you want to be a blessing? Do you want to be a blessed person? Then, you need to have this kind of thinking, the kind of thinking that understanding life.  What is the life?  To Abraham, he knows that life is meaningless unless we can accomplish one thing, which is to seek God, to experience blessing of the almighty God, to seek eternal life, and to seek the glorious God.

I trained this doctrine, it’s called the Doctrine of Destiny. Abraham paid a heavy price, he lost a comfortable life and started a journey that has an unknown future.  He made a great bet, he bet on the future, he bet on the name of the Lord.  This person, Abraham, he called on to the name of Lord.  He built an altar to the Lord. He did not seeking his own name. You see, that's something very interesting. That is point number one, Abraham is seeking the meaning of life, basically, he saw people come and go, people were born and passed away, and then, he looked down to all the difficulty in life.

Point number 2, Abraham was a not a complaining king, he never even murmuring about the environment, he never complained about the environment, and we have a lot of things to learn from him.  Point number 3, Abraham never seek his own name.  In Genesis Chapter 11, people want to make their own name.

Do not make your own name

People want to make their name and God will come down. God, destroy their project. If you want to watch the people around us in our time. We are not able to go back to 4000 years ago, but we can watch today for those people who want to make their name. Do you know what happened? They bring disaster. They bring destruction to their life. But people who seek the name of the Lord and God will make their name great. God will make their name great now even people do not want to make their name great, but God will make their name great. Here we can see there are two paths. One path is to go by the blessing of the Almighty God. The other path wants to make their name, but in the end, all parish. Do you want to follow this Abraham's path? You want to follow Abraham's path, you probably go to pay some price.

We are not those cheap grace kind of gospel. We are the gospel of paying a heavy price and because it's Abraham paying a heavy price, he suffered quite a little bit. If you are a Pastor who wants to build your church and you want to make your name great so that a lot of churches will invite you here and there and they will give you a love offering, and then you will make your name great. Probably you have a problem. You will have a problem there and I see a lot of sorrowful stories about the pastors. Now the pastor becomes very famous and then they have all kinds of trouble.

Do you know what am I doing here? I want to hide so that I will not make my name known. I don't know. I want to make my name known. I do not want to be famous. Everyone it is normal you have a website like that right? You never see my name on the website. Now. You will see the name of a doctrine, the doctrine of destiny, and a lot of people do not know who this guy (behind this doctrine) was. And then they'll ask around who is this guy behind this doctrine of destiny? I don't want my name known. Yeah, I learn from this. I learn from this and somehow God will make my name great as a separate thing and as a different thing. We are a Church of no name, no face. Well, we only have the name of God. We only have the face of God, yeah. That is how it works. OK, this is a very important chapter and this is a very important chapter we call the doctrine of destiny.

Bless all the people on the earth

Why? We live for God, we die for God. We are searching for eternal life. We are searching for the glorious Crown going to be given by God. We are seeking a city, not only the earth. We are not seeking a city on this earth. We are seeking a new Jerusalem. We are building a church, full of the glory of Almighty God. That's what we are going to do, that's what we live for it, we die for it. We offer the whole of our life to God. Even God says: go and we will go, come and we will come. Even paying a heavy price and that exactly the footstep of Abraham and the footstep of Jesus and the footsteps of apostle Paul. No Fear. Only have a destiny, destiny is what we live for and we are what we die for. We are so determined, why? Because on this earth everything, my job, the money in the bank account, although it is real money, it's not a not printed by my own, not even draw by my pencil. The money is not drawn by my pencil. Are real money in the bank account and every time you see how many thousand how many 100,000? Yeah, it's real money, right? But it is meaningless, meaningless, vanity upon vanity. We are seeking. We are seeking the name of the Almighty God so that we make this life meaningful through the name of the Almighty God. And this is how it works. A lot of churches facing challenges. Yes, we do face challenges, but we are still prospering. Because God will show his glory among us and because the glory of Almighty God among us and a lot of people come to us. What I dream of is that I would hope to be a blessing to all the people on the earth and will be blessed through me.

How am I going to bless the people on the earth? Through me, show them the doctrine of destiny and whoever takes on this, I'm sure they will see the glory of Almighty God, is much worth much, much more than the bank account and God will make you great Nation. God will bless you and God will make your name great. And God will bless those who bless you and curse those who curse you. And this is true. I know I've seen a lot of people who curse me. Let me tell you they will get cursed. They will get cursed and God will curse them. Not me, not I curse them. It's God curse them. Are you with me? So never curse Abraham, and bless Abraham and you will get a blessing. And this is what I say, and a lot of people agree with what I say, right? And those people who get close to me somehow, they are blessed, or (they) bless me and get blessed.

I know I saw this amazing person a business(woman) comes to me. She lost about 20 million, forty million, regardless of whether it is in Renminbi or Sing dollars or U.S. dollars. Forty million is a huge amount and she still has to pay for the debt. And her daughter is studying in the UK and she is supposed to send the money to her. She got no money to send. In the bank account, there is not enough to pay the interest of her debt, she wants to jump out of the building. She wants to jump down from the building. Somehow on the Internet, she found me and called me up. I've talked to her over the phone. She is a business(woman) and has a lot of projects; A lot of projects hanging halfway.

You know what happened as I pray for her; Her situation turned around the next day. The next day she had a parking lot supposed to sell away in the downtown city parking lot. And this parking lot is supposed to sell for $260,000 and nobody asked. Nobody wants to buy it, but worth $260.00. And on Saturday, the day after she called me (Friday), someone walked to walk into her office. They say: " I'm willing to pay 290,000 to buy your parking lot". And Saturday she called me up and says: This is great!"  You see the blessing works. Blessing work, it is not blessing doesn't work. God is a faithful God. God is a faithful God. You see,(remarked): "Oh no, my God, I don't have a strong faith like Abraham". You see does Abraham has a strong faith? If he has a strong faith then he doesn't have to go to Egypt. If he had a strong faith, he doesn't have to tell the wife to say: You are my sister, otherwise, people will kill me. Yeah, are you with me? Abraham has his weakness. He has his weakness. He's not a man of strong faith at all, but he is the man; Sometimes we call weak. But God is still faithful. Yes, you have your shortcoming, right?

People want to make their name and God will come down and you know what? God, destroy their project. If you want to watch the people around us in our time. We are not able to go back to 4000 years ago, but we can watch today for those people who want to make their name. Do you know what happened? They bring disaster. They bring destruction to their life. But people who seek the name of the Lord and God will make their name great. God will make their name great now even people do not want to make their name great, but God will make their name great.

Here we can see there are two paths. One path is to go by the blessing of the Almighty God. The other path wants to make their name, but in the end, all parish. Do you want to follow this Abraham's path? You want to follow Abraham's path, you probably go to pay some price. We are not those cheap grace kind of gospel. We are the gospel of paying a heavy price and because it's Abraham paying a heavy price, he suffered quite a little bit. If you are a Pastor who wants to build your church and you want to make your name great so that a lot of churches will invite you here and there and they will give you a love offering, and then you will make your name great. Probably you have a problem. You will have a problem there and I see a lot of sorrowful stories about the pastors. Now the pastor becomes very famous and then they have all kinds of trouble. Do you know what am I doing here? I want to hide so that I will not make my name known. I don't know. I want to make my name known. I do not want to be famous. Everyone it is normal you have a website like that right? You never see my name on the website. Now. You will see the name of a doctrine, the doctrine of destiny, and a lot of people do not know who this guy (behind this doctrine) was. And then they'll ask around who is this guy behind this doctrine of destiny? I don't want my name known. Yeah, I learn from this. I learn from this and somehow God will make my name great as a separate thing and as a different thing. We are a Church of no name, no face. Well, we only have the name of God. We only have the face of God, yeah. That is how it works. OK, this is a very important chapter and this is a very important chapter we call the doctrine of destiny.

Live for destiny and seek the name of God

Why? We live for God, we die for God. We are searching for eternal life. We are searching for the glorious Crown going to be given by God. We are seeking a city, not only the earth. We are not seeking a city on this earth. We are seeking a new Jerusalem. We are building a church, full of the glory of Almighty God. That's what we are going to do, that's what we live for it, we die for it. We offer the whole of our life to God. Even God says: go and we will go, come and we will come. Even paying a heavy price and that exactly the footstep of Abraham and the footstep of Jesus and the footsteps of apostle Paul. No Fear. Only have a destiny, destiny is what we live for and we are what we die for. We are so determined, why? Because on this earth everything, my job, the money in the bank account, although it is real money, it's not a not printed by my own, not even draw by my pencil. The money is not drawn by my pencil. Are real money in the bank account and every time you see how many thousand how many 100,000? Yeah, it's real money, right? But it is meaningless, meaningless, vanity upon vanity. We are seeking. We are seeking the name of the Almighty God so that we make this life meaningful through the name of the Almighty God. And this is how it works. A lot of churches facing challenges. Yes, we do face challenges, but we are still prospering. Because God God will show his glory among us and because the glory of Almighty God among us and a lot of people come to us, you see. What I dream for. What I dream of is this. I would hope to be a blessing to all the people on the earth and will be blessed through me.

How am I going to bless the people on the earth? Through me, show them the doctrine of destiny and whoever takes on this, I'm sure they will see the glory of Almighty God, is much worth much, much more than the bank account and God will make you great Nation. God will bless you and God will make your name great. And God will bless those who bless you and curse those who curse you. And this is true. I know I've seen a lot of people who curse me. Let me tell you they will get cursed. They will get cursed and God will curse them. Not me, not I curse them. It's God curse them. Are you with me? So never curse Abraham, and bless Abraham and you will get a blessing. And this is what I say, and a lot of people agree with what I say, right? And those people who get close to me somehow, they are blessed, or (they) bless me and get blessed.

I know I saw this amazing person a business(woman) comes to me. She lost about 20 million, forty million, regardless of whether it is in Renminbi or Sing dollars or U.S. dollars. Forty million is a huge amount and she still has to pay for the debt. And her daughter is studying in the UK and she is supposed to send the money to her. She got no money to send. In the bank account, there is not enough to pay the interest of her debt, she wants to jump out of the building. She wants to jump down from the building. Somehow on the Internet, she found me and called me up. I've talked to her over the phone. She is a business(woman) and has a lot of projects; A lot of projects hanging halfway.

You know what happened as I pray for her; Her situation turned around the next day. The next day she had a parking lot supposed to sell away in the downtown city parking lot. And this parking lot is supposed to sell for $260,000 and nobody asked. Nobody wants to buy it, but worth $260.00. And on Saturday, the day after she called me (Friday), someone walked to walk into her office. They say: " I'm willing to pay 290,000 to buy your parking lot". And Saturday she called me up and says: This is great!"  You see the blessing works. Blessing work, it is not blessing doesn't work. God is a faithful God. God is a faithful God. You see,(remarked): "Oh no, my God, I don't have a strong faith like Abraham". You see does Abraham has a strong faith? If he has a strong faith then he doesn't have to go to Egypt. If he had a strong faith, he doesn't have to tell the wife to say: You are my sister, otherwise, people will kill me.  Abraham has his weakness. He has his weakness. He's not a man of strong faith at all, but he is the man; Sometimes we call weak. But God is still faithful. Yes, you have your shortcoming, right?

And Saturday, she called me up and said: “This is great!"  You see, the blessing works. Blessing works, not blessing doesn't work. God is a faithful God. You see: "Oh no, my God, I don't have a strong faith like Abraham". Did Abraham have a strong faith? If he had a strong faith, then he wouldn’t have to go to Egypt. If he had a strong faith, he didn’t have to tell the wife to say: “You are my sister, otherwise, people will kill me.” Are you with me?

Abraham has his weaknesses. He's not a man of strong faith at all, but he is a man we sometimes call weak. But God is still faithful. Yes, you have your shortcomings, right? You have some weakness; you have this and that. And fortunately, Abraham was someone that was not that perfect. And fortunately, he was not perfect. Because he was not perfect, we have a chance. Do you agree with me? If Abraham was a perfect person, and you and I were not so perfect, then I have no more chance.

But because he (Abraham) is not perfect, then don’t criticize him. Don’t apply critical thinking onto Abraham. Are you with me? And don’t challenge him; he lived four thousand years ago. We don’t have to apply the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil onto him, we have to learn; he can do this, and God still made him a great nation. And God still made his name great. And somehow, that is the level of faith, but still having to go to Egypt, living in the land which God promised to him: “This is the land I’m giving you, and this land is having a famine”.

And Abraham never lost faith in the Lord. “Famine, so what? Short of food, so what? Go to Egypt, so what? And this land God will give to me, God is a faithful God”. And you know what Abraham was thinking? Abraham is a very clever person. “God, you want to test me, right?”

If you face a challenge, let me tell you, do not complain. If you do, the blessing that is already in your hand is flying away. Lots of people, lots of Christians like to complain. And the blessing is leaking out of their own hands. She already touched the blessing, she already held the blessing, but the blessing is gone. What kind of sorrow is that? And because Abraham was a faithful man, a man of faith, he trusted in the Lord. He said: “A famine? God, you want to test me? I will pass this test. I am sure I will pass; I will never, ever change my trust in the Lord.”

You know what happened? Sure enough, the Egyptian king actually took his wife away. And they put her in the palace of the Egyptian king, called Pharoah. And she didn’t do anything. And she did not go to the Egyptian king and fight over the matter. The Egyptian king gave him lots of cattle, sheep, male and female donkeys, maidservants, manservants, and camels. Abraham was really a good business man! He got a lot in a return.

You know what the Lord has done? Even facing Abraham. He did not complain about the famine, he went through the test of faith. And even he had weaknesses: “Don’t say you are my wife”. Even though he had such a big weakness, and such a big problem, God was still a faithful God. God is a faithful God. Although Abraham had done this, he never (strayed?) from God’s promise.

You know what happened? The Lord is so faithful. He got the Egyptian king and his household and gave them diseases. Probably not Covid-19, but rather Covid-3000 to Covid-4000. Because it was 4000 years ago. Probably Covid-2000 BC.

And the Lord had done a great thing, right? This Egyptian king returned Abraham’s wife. And then, in return, gave Abraham a lot of things. And he asked Abraham to take the wife away, and he managed to survive through the hand of the Egyptian king. You know the Egyptian king, to kill Abraham, would be like an ant, it would be so simple. But God protected him.

Am I answering a lot of your concerns? And this is what they call the path of destiny. Do you want to follow this footpath, in the footsteps of Abraham? Yes! Even going through any test, you will stand firm in the promise of the Lord! We would never change our trust in the Lord! No matter what situation it is, what type of suffering we have gone through, we will still trust in the Lord. Because on the earth, all this suffering is no big deal. It is no big deal, even when someone makes us lose this, lose that. No big deal.

Exactly! From now on, you will learn what kind of footsteps Abraham walked in. He passed on the belief of the mind, the knowledge of God, to his son, and his grandsons, and to the great-grandsons. So, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph. All of them followed in the footsteps of Abraham, which they called Destiny. And because of this destiny, we live for the Lord, we die for the Lord. That is why you will have blessing. And if you want to have blessing, put down yourself. And if you want to see blessings, put down yourself. Take the system of thinking; of this doctrine of destiny.

Why do we pay a heavy price to serve the Lord, to minister a lot of people? It is because this is what we live for. Why do we lay down many things, and even lay down our family? Because this is what we live for, and die for, and this is my life, my Destiny, my Ming ding (destiny in Mandarin). All comes from Genesis chapter twelve. Wonderful chapter.

Let's read this again.

The Lord had said to Abram, “Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you.

“I will make you into a great nation,
    and I will bless you;
I will make your name great,
    and you will be a blessing.
I will bless those who bless you,
    and whoever curses you I will curse;
and all peoples on earth
    will be blessed through you.”

Genesis 12:1-3 (NIV)

If you want, you can actually change the “you” to “me”.

Let’s read this again.

“God will make me into a great nation, and God will bless me; God will make my name great, and I will be a blessing.  God will bless those who bless me, and whoever curses me God will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through me.”

And this is exactly what I dream for, and what I live for, and what I die for! Are you with me? And this is what the whole group of people are like. So, if you want to learn the lesson, I am sure among us, we have a bad habit. I am sure it is not like a man of faith, but a man of murmuring, a man of complaining. Don’t let this blessing slip through our hand; we already touched the treasure, we already touched something we cannot even measure by price. It is priceless, it is so powerful. Don’t let it get out of our hand, because we are not following the footsteps of Abraham.

I am sure some of us have the habit of complaining. It is because we eat too much of the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil. If you eat the fruit of faith, you will walk the life of Destiny. If your eyes are looking at the earthly things, looking on the carnal things, the flesh, the challenges and difficulties, I am very sure you are not walking on the path of Abraham.

Remember, don’t let this blessing slip through your hand. Hold on to it tightly; we call it our Destiny. My Destiny. I will be sure there will be blessing. The people on earth will surely be blessed through me.

Thank you, and God bless you. In Jesus’ name, Amen!