Genesis 26:12-22 NKJV Then Isaac sowed in that land, and reaped in the same year a hundredfold; and the LORD blessed him. (13) The man began to prosper, and continued prospering until he became very prosperous; (14) for he had possessions of flocks and possessions of herds and a great number of servants. So the Philistines envied him. (15) Now the Philistines had stopped up all the wells which his father’s servants had dug in the days of Abraham his father, and they had filled them with earth. (16) And Abimelech said to Isaac, “Go away from us, for you are much mightier than we.” (17) Then Isaac departed from there and pitched his tent in the Valley of Gerar, and dwelt there. (18) And Isaac dug again the wells of water which they had dug in the days of Abraham his father, for the Philistines had stopped them up after the death of Abraham. He called them by the names which his father had called them. (19) Also Isaac’s servants dug in the valley, and found a well of running water there. (20) But the herdsmen of Gerar quarreled with Isaac’s herdsmen, saying, “The water is ours.” So he called the name of the well Esek, because they quarreled with him. (21) Then they dug another well, and they quarreled over that one also. So he called its name Sitnah. (22) And he moved from there and dug another well, and they did not quarrel over it. So he called its name Rehoboth, because he said, “For now the LORD has made room for us, and we shall be fruitful in the land.”
- The Lord has begun to really bless and prosper Isaac, and as a people Isaac, the forefather to Israel, has already become much mightier than the Philistines.
- God has told Isaac to settle in this land, the promised land, and so Isaac begins digging wells… looking for a place of fresh water to settle down by.
- But as he begins to look for the perfect spot, he finds that the Philistines have really become an enemy to him.
- They have filled in all of the wells that his father Abraham had dug…
- And as he digs new wells, they come against him.
- First his servants dig a well and find water, and the philistines show up and quarrel with him “THIS IS OUR LAND! THIS IS OUR WATER! YOU CAN’T LIVE HERE!” Thus the well was called Esek, the well of Striving and Quarrelling.
- And so the mighty and powerful Isaac and all his people move on, though they could have fought and won… they decided to keep looking.
- The Second well the dug up also found water, and the Philistines again came against Isaac for this well of water. Thus Isaac names the well Sitnah which means “Accusations and enmity”.
- Isaac, though he has EVERY RIGHT to this well, and is far mightier than the philistines… he decides once again to move on, choosing to look for another well instead of looking for a fight…
- Finally Isaac comes to the third well, and this time there was no quarrel, no accusations, no strife, no enmity… this time there was room enough.
Genesis 26:22 NKJV And he moved from there and dug another well, and they did not quarrel over it. So he called its name Rehoboth, because he said, “For now the LORD has made room for us, and we shall be fruitful in the land.”
- This morning marks the second sermon going over these verses in a small series I am calling “Which Well will You Chose”.
- Which well will you choose… because you have to settle near fresh water, and here there are three wells to chose from… will you chose strife… will you chose accusation… or will you chose “Room Enough”.
- You know we did a little thought exercise last week, I want to do another one… there is no trick this time… just a simple thought exercise…
- I want to read to you a couple of verses from a Psalm, and I read, I really want you to imagine that you are there, that you are in this psalm… imagine the things being describe as if they are around you… it is very simple, and I want it to be very peaceful for this moment… just put yourself in this psalm, a very famous couple of verses most of you know… paint the picture with your mind as I read it, okay?
Psalms 23:1-2 NKJV A Psalm of David. The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. (2) He makes me to lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside the still waters.
- The Lord is my shepherd… would you imagine Jesus as your shepherd this morning… guiding you and leading you by your hand so sweetly and peacefully.
- I shall not want… imagine what it would be like to be with Jesus, perfectly content… you have everything you could have ever wanted… you have no more need for wants.
- He makes me lie down in green pastures… imagine those green pastures… the rolling hills, the warm sunlight on your face, a cool breeze blowing over the landscape as you lie down on the soft grass with your Savior.
- He leads me beside the still waters… fresh, clean water… maybe a pond… or maybe a well like Isaac dug… either way, I bet that water is cool and it is calm, it is pleasant to look at, it is sweet to drink, it is the living waters that give eternal life…
- So there you are, with Jesus as your shepherd, in the green grass next to living water… and you have no wants or desires…
- Have you ever just meditated on this passage? I wonder, as you did this experiment… how many of you imagined that the green grass you laid on was packed with people… thousands of people fighting over where to lay down… “No that is my patch of grass! Find your own!”… “Hey you, move out of the way! You are blocking my view to the water!”
- No, I bet we all imagined ourselves on large open stretches of land, no one else in sight but our Jesus.
- Now don’t get me wrong, heaven is not empty… it’s just not overpopulated. There is room enough for everyone to be with Jesus… there is room enough for everyone to have peace… there is room enough for everyone to be prosperous…
- Because that is what we see in this psalm… peace and prosperity… He makes me lie down in peace… I shall not want for anything.
- Maybe not the same kind of prosperity the world teaches… but a kind of prosperity that comes with contentment…
- And this is what we see with Isaac… he finds the well Rehoboth, which means literally “Room enough” and here he finds peace and prosperity. And that is what we are going to talk about today… the peace and prosperity that comes with being a “Room enough” kind of Christian… the peace and prosperity that comes with being a “Room Enough” kind of church.
Point One – Peace Comes When There is Room Enough
Genesis 26:20-22 NKJV But the herdsmen of Gerar quarreled with Isaac’s herdsmen, saying, “The water is ours.” So he called the name of the well Esek, because they quarreled with him. (21) Then they dug another well, and they quarreled over that one also. So he called its name Sitnah. (22) And he moved from there and dug another well, and they did not quarrel over it. So he called its name Rehoboth, because he said, “For now the LORD has made room for us, and we shall be fruitful in the land.”
- Peace comes when there is room enough… they dug another well and they did not quarrel over it… there was Rehoboth… there was room enough.
- Last week I addressed some major issues within the church… not just our church, but the American Church… and probably the global church.
- We talked about how being a person who quarrels and fights and strives against other Christians only leads you to be isolated from the body of Christ.
- And we talked about how if you are an accuser of the breathren, then you have aligned yourself with Satan… after all Satan and Sitnah come from the same root word in Hebrew, it means “Accusation”.
- And we talked about a better way… we talked about being peacemakers… as much as it is possible with you make peace with all men.
- And we talked about righteous judgment… how to judge rightly as a Christian. We judge first by getting sin out of our own lives, then we judge based on the fruit.
- We are quick to listen and slow to speak.
- We think higher of others than ourselves, remembering that as we help our brother with the spec in his eye… that this is indeed our brother or sister in Christ and should be treated with love, even when dealing with their sin.
- So by judging rightly and by being a peacemaker we move on from Sitnah and Esek… we move on from Accusations and strife… but where do we settle? We settle where there is room enough. We settle at Rehoboth… and when we do, we find peace.
- So what does it mean to be a Room Enough church… to be a Rehoboth Christian… it means that we make room for all kinds of people… we make room for all kinds of culture… we make room for all kinds of Christians.
Galatians 3:26-29 NKJV For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. (27) For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. (28) There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. (29) And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.
- What does this verse mean? Does this mean that we are all transgender, transracial, transcultural Christians?
- NO! Of course not. This does not mean “There are no men in the church and there are no women in the church”
- This does not mean “There are no Jews in the Church and there are no foreigners in the church.”
- It’s quite the opposite, actually. It means “There are so many men, and so many women, and so many foreigners, and so many locals… there is such a diversity in the church but we all have this one thing in common… and we have decided that this one thing is the one thing that defines us.
- Not our manhood… not our womanhood…
- Not our nationality.
- Not our culture.
- Not our age.
- Not our legal status… whether we are convicts or free men.
- NO! The one thing that defines us is that we have put on Christ Jesus. We have been born again. We have been baptized and have put on Christ.
Galatians 3:29 NKJV And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.
- You know Isaac, who was literally Abraham’s son, literally Abraham’s seed… literally Heir according to the promise God gave to Abraham…
- Isaac had A LOT OF PEOPLE with him… he had more people with him than all of the Philistines put together… he was MUCH MIGHTIER than the philistines… that is what King Abimelech of the Philistines said to Isaac in verse 16 “You are much mightier than we are”.
- So Isaac had a TON of people with him… yet he was at peace… there was no more quarrelling…
Genesis 26:22 NKJV And he moved from there and dug another well, and they did not quarrel over it. So he called its name Rehoboth, because he said, “For now the LORD has made room for us, and we shall be fruitful in the land.”
- AND THEY DID NOT QUARELL OVER IT.
- There was room enough for the family of God to settle.
- You see what I am saying church is that the world hates us… and the world is going to quarrel with us… and the enemy is going to accuse us..
- And that is fine… no weapon formed against me shall prosper…
- But can we as the family of God, can we say “You know what, there is room enough here…
- There is room enough for different cultural backgrounds here.
- There is room enough for different political opinions here.
- There is room enough for different theological stances here.
- There is room enough for poor people here.
- There is room enough for rich people here.
- There is room enough for ex-convicts here.
- You know what there is even room enough for squares like my wife who have never even thought about committing a crime.
- I’m just kidding, my wife is not a square she is the love of my life… she just grew up cul-de-sac and I grew up street.
- Listen church… If we can find room enough in our marriage to make that work then you can find room enough on Sunday morning to make that work… and when you do, how peaceful it will be.
Psalms 133:1-3 NKJV A Song of Ascents. Of David. Behold, how good and how pleasant it is For brethren to dwell together in unity! (2) It is like the precious oil upon the head, Running down on the beard, The beard of Aaron, Running down on the edge of his garments. (3) It is like the dew of Hermon, Descending upon the mountains of Zion; For there the LORD commanded the blessing—Life forevermore.
- Look at that first verse again “How good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity” Good and pleasant… like laying down in green pastures next to still waters… good and pleasant…
- How good and pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity.
- This doesn’t mean we don’t stand for the truth, and it doesn’t mean we don’t speak the truth… but it means that we speak the truth in love as Ephesians 4:15 teaches us too…
- Unity doesn’t mean that we always agree on everything… but it means that if you are born again, and I am born again, and we both have the Holy Spirit working inside of us, convicting us, growing us, helping us… then even though we disagree, we are family… and there is room enough in this church for ALL of the family of Christ.
- Not just the family of Christ that agrees with my strongly held opinions.
- You see at CLC we are a place to belong… and if you are born again, truly born again… then there is room enough for you here in this church… Amen?
- Now if we all have that mindset then the quarrels and the striving will cease, and there will be peace in this church. Oh how I long for this place to be a place of peace… we must make room enough, amen‽
- Now that brings me to point two this morning: Prosperity comes when there is room enough!
Point Two – Prosperity Comes When There is Room Enough
Genesis 26:22 NKJV And he moved from there and dug another well, and they did not quarrel over it. So he called its name Rehoboth, because he said, “For now the LORD has made room for us, and we shall be fruitful in the land.”
- And we shall be fruitful in the land! We will prosper, we will grow, we will multiply!
- You see Biblically the idea of there being more room means that there is more blessings and prosperity… Y’all remember a decade or so ago when the prayer of Jabez was really big… look at how this prayer starts…
1Chronicles 4:10a NKJV And Jabez called on the God of Israel saying, “Oh, that You would bless me indeed, and enlarge my territory…
- Oh that you would bless me and enlarge my territory! That is how Jabez prays for prosperity! Let there be Rehoboth! Let there be room enough!
- Isiah 54 is full of promises, in fact going back to the previous point, Isiah 54 is called the Eternal Covenant of Peace… but look how it describes prosperity and blessings…
Isaiah 54:2-3 NKJV “Enlarge the place of your tent, And let them stretch out the curtains of your dwellings; Do not spare; Lengthen your cords, And strengthen your stakes. (3) For you shall expand to the right and to the left, And your descendants will inherit the nations, And make the desolate cities inhabited.
- Enlarge, Stretch, Lengthen, Expand! These are words or blessings and prosperity!
- You see Biblical prosperity is not about private jets and fat bank accounts. There is an element to prosperity about wealth, but generally that is only a small part of it.
- Instead Biblical prosperity is more about having lots of children, having a big family, having tons of friends that you are in covenant with.
- It is a communal prosperity, we are in this together, we are prospering together, we are thriving together.
- And the more prosperous we are, the more children we have, the more friendships in Christ we build… well the more land we need, the more room we need… we need REHOBOTH.
- And when we have Rehoboth, church… when we have room enough for all kinds of people from all kinds of cultures, and all kinds of backgrounds… when we truly believe that in Christ… and that part is important, the in Christ part… but when we truly believe that in Christ there is no Greek, there is no jew, there is no gentile… Then God begins to grow us and expand our territory… and when we have that Rehoboth mindset… we begin to prosper in ways that bank accounts alone can’t quantify…
- I will give you an example of how this prosperity works… this is a real question, I want you to answer honestly… don’t feel bad if you can’t answer positively, that’s ok… this is just an example… but, I am just curious, by a show of hands… how many of you would let my family sleep in your house, in your apartment, in your living room… whatever… how many of you would let us crash with you if our house burnt down? Just until we got a new home or got the insurance figured out… how many of you would let us Shields stay with you?
- *Count hands*
- You know my insurance has tried a couple of times to get me to add “Hotel insurance”. They say “What if you house burned down? Add hotel insurance and we will pay for the hotel while your house gets fixed”
- To which I respond “I have *so-many* homes to stay in!”
- Didn’t work for the derecho because WE ALL LOST POWER… so it still might be a good investment… but you get my point.
- THIS IS PROSPERITY!
- As long as I am a part of the family of God I have no reason to fear homelessness.
- I have people who take me to the airport…
- I have people who watch my kids…
- People who help with chores when I am overwhelmed with ministry work.
- Why? Because I am wealthy? No! Far from it! A wealthy person might be able to hire people to do these things… but I have a different kind of prosperity… I have a room enough prosperity, a Rehoboth Prosperity.
- I have brothers and sisters in Christ from every Continent…
- Why? Am I that important that immigration officers single handedly walk us through past the lines and through immigration?
- No! It is because my family in Christ is so broad and so expanded that it includes Ghanian pastors and officials.
- I went to Japan and was treated to the most fancy and expensive dinner I have ever eaten by a Japanese man I met in Mexico City.
- Why? Is it because I have so much money that this man wants to woe me and convince me to do business with him? NO! It is because God has expanded my borders…
- You see church I have a prosperity that is more than I could ever imagine… but it is not a financial prosperity, it is a REHOBOTH prosperity.
- And you can have this kind of prosperity too when you get a Room Enough mindset… when you chose “I want to live where there is room enough”
- I don’t want Sitnah… I don’t want Esek! I reject strife, I reject accusations and enmity, I reject quarrelling! I chose to live where there is room enough!
- King David understood that prosperity came with a room enough mindset… do you remember when he was fleeing from Saul… He raised an army… who was in that army?
1 Samuel 22:1-2 NKJV David therefore departed from there and escaped to the cave of Adullam. So when his brothers and all his father’s house heard it, they went down there to him. (2) And everyone who was in distress, everyone who was in debt, and everyone who was discontented gathered to him. So he became captain over them. And there were about four hundred men with him.
- So who was with David? Well his family, ok… that makes sense… but that would not have been enough to form an army… who else… Well, everyone who was in distress… people who are in destress can be difficult to deal with, I know, I help out a lot of people in distress… and not just them, but people who are in debt… Man David was just taking anybody… low credit score, no credit score… COME ON IN!
- But not just debt and distress, but everyone who was discontented and disgruntled…
- Man he just had a mob of poor and angry and distressed people. But David said “Rehoboth!” There is room enough for you!
- Imagine if David said “No! Not you people… you are too poor, to difficult to manage… I am to be king after all! I will only be surrounded by people of Noble blood!
- Well David would have nobody and would have died alone. But that is not what happened. DAVID PROSPERED! He became king and had one of the must successful reigns as king in all of Israel.
- And church you can have this for your life! You can have this kind of prosperity, this kind of favor, when you have a ROOM ENOUGH mentality.
- When you chose to humble yourself and to allow yourself to enter into close fellowship with all believers, all the born again…
- When you choose to reject strife and accusations.
- When you choose to be a peacemaker in the house of God and to judge rightly.
- When you choose to get to church early, and leave late… so you can talk to people you don’t know… hear their stories, and build lasting bonds and friendships.
- Man we are a room enough church… room enough for the poor, room enough for the rich, room enough for the young and room enough for the old… room enough for felons, and yes room enough for the lawe abiding citizens… heavens, church, we even have room enough for Stealers fans! I don’t know how we have so many Stealers fans in this church but we have room enough for you.
- And if you, saints, would have a room enough attituted… room enough for all believers… not just people who look like me and act like me… but room enough for all the born again who are called according to His purpose… then you too will have Rehoboth peace and Rehoboth prosperity…
- Now let me conclude by talking about that Room Enough Peace just once more.
Conclusion
Luke 2:4-7 NKJV Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David, (5) to be registered with Mary, his betrothed wife, who was with child. (6) So it was, that while they were there, the days were completed for her to be delivered. (7) And she brought forth her firstborn Son, and wrapped Him in swaddling cloths, and laid Him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.
- Joseph knocks on the innkeepers door… he says “My wife is very pregnant and might give birth at any moment, please rent me a room to stay in.”
- But the innkeeper said “We don’t have room enough for you here, Joseph, we don’t have room enough for you or your wife, or the baby inside her. There is no Rehoboth here… there is no room here in the inn”.
- Now catch this… The innkeeper said “There is no room here” Which by the way wasn’t entirely true… the innkeeper and his wife could have given up their room… the innkeeper could have slept in the manager so that the pregnant woman had a clean warm bed to sleep in… but no, he said “There is not room enough” and in doing so the innkeeper missed out ON THE PRINCE OF PEACE.
- There were men from other countries who went on a long journey to see this prince of peace and bring him gifts…
- But not the innkeeper… Jesus CAME to the innkeeper… the innkeeper did not need gold, or myrrh or frankincense… he did not need camels to carry his gear or a star in the sky to follow… all he needed to do was make room enough…
- I wonder if you have made room enough for Jesus in your heart… if you have made room enough for the prince of peace?
Join us this Sunday at either 8:30AM or 10:30AM for worship followed by this message from the Word of God.
Christian Life Church of Cedar Rapids
2808 Schaeffer DR SW,
Cedar Rapids, IA 52404
www.CedarRapidsChurch.com
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