Gen 23:4, "I am a stranger and a sojourner among you; give me a burial site among you, that I may bury my dead out of my sight." 
We continue this morning with the great witness that we have in Abraham with regard to his detachment from the things of this world. As he was burying his beloved wife, Sarah, he makes this very astute statement with respect to how we are to view ourselves in this realm. "I am a stranger and a sojourner among you… He considered himself without ties to this world in light of the fact that he was fully committed to God and God’s Promise. He was seeking after a greater heritage than this world had to offer. He was much more greatly concerned with his friendship with God, as was evidenced in the fact that he had been willing to sacrifice his only son through his beloved Sarah as an offering because God had so instructed him accordingly. 
Abraham considered his relationship with God of such higher and greater importance than all the possessions of this age. He considered himself a stranger in this world and a wanderer without a home. He could not find his satisfaction in the things of this realm, but focused on that which he found at the pleasure of God’s heart. 
Such should be true with us in every measure, as we began to consider last time. We are not to find ourselves attached to this realm with all its false promises and deceitful facades. Rather, we are to set our minds and our hearts on the truth of Jesus Christ and seek after those things which are above. As the Apostle Paul so encourages us, as we read together in Col 3:1-5. Col 3:1-5, If then you have been raised up with Christ, keep seeking the things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth. For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, is revealed, then you also will be revealed with Him in glory. Therefore consider the members of your earthly body as dead to immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed, which amounts to idolatry. 
This was the course that Abraham followed, to the best of his ability, in the light of instruction as given by God, Almighty. So are we to be focused in our attitude and our behavior in this realm. We are not to be found seeking the mammon and the praise and the fame and the power of this age, but are to be earnestly desirous after that which will please God to the fullest. This will require that complete death to self of which we so often refer, yet so weakly employ. We are to very fully …consider the members of your earthly body as dead to immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed, which amounts to idolatry. 
This means that we can no longer look out for our own interests in any of our dealings with others. We are no longer enabled to stand up for our rights and for those things that we consider to be detrimental to our individual benefit. Every decision we make, every choice we follow, every word we speak, every thought we consider must be put before the Lord for His wisdom and His guidance and unto His glory. 
This will absolutely make us strangers and aliens in this realm as we no longer accede to nor seek the approval or the counsel of the wisdom of this age. These earthly elements are to no longer have our preference over the constant honor of God and His way of death to self. That is completely foreign and foolishness in this world’s view of how to live, but it is the way of the cross, the way of Christ now living His life forth from us unto others.
In this putting to death of self interests, we join ourselves to the heart of the Psalmist as recorded in Ps 119:12-20. Please turn again to this passage. Ps 119:12-20, Blessed art Thou, O Lord; Teach me Thy statutes. With my lips I have told of All the ordinances of Thy mouth. I have rejoiced in the way of Thy testimonies, As much as in all riches. I will meditate on Thy precepts, And regard Thy ways. I shall delight in Thy statutes; I shall not forget Thy word. Deal bountifully with Thy servant, That I may live and keep Thy word. Open my eyes, that I may behold Wonderful things from Thy law. I am a stranger in the earth; Do not hide Thy commandments from me. My soul is crushed with longing After Thine ordinances at all times. Amen.
We will not be ashamed of seeking after the Lord to manifest His truth and His reality in the every course of our lives. We will not look at the differential aspects presented by this world as more desirable, but will see them in the truth of the lies and the entrapments that they are. Our hearts will more and more gravitate to the Word and to the Holy Spirit as the source of how we are to live and to interact with all those in our spheres of influence. We will seek the Holy Spirit to make His Word our every, day to day course of life in this realm. Yes, we will be in complete agreement when we are accused of being out of touch with the reality of this world. However, we will find that we are very much in living touch with the true Lord of this whole of creation. In this world’s eyes, there will be a strangeness in the manner of our facing the every challenge of this age. Yet, we will become so amazed at how the Lord proves Himself over and over again in the reality that He has overcome this world. John 16:33, "These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world." 
Our hearts will rejoice in the fact that we are no longer entangled in all the snares and the smoke-screen complexities of this realm. We are, in deed, freed from it all in the life of Jesus Christ! Yes, we will face animosity and peril and strife and trials and persecution because we will not conform to the mannerisms and the philosophies and the methodologies of this age. However, we will find true solace and comfort and peace in the midst of all the turmoil in the very words spoken by Our Lord Jesus Christ as we read in several other passages in the Gospel of John. 
	John 15:19, "If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. In this truth, we find the realization that yes, we are not like others who do not have the life of Jesus Christ coursing throughout every aspect of our beings. The hatred that we face, as we live by Christ, is to be expected. In fact, it would be very disheartening if that were not being evidenced in our witness of the One by Whom we have eternal salvation. 
	Then, as we listen to Christ in His High Priestly prayer, there rings forth such comfort in the reality that this world has nothing to offer us because we are joined livingly, eternally, and Omnipotently to Jesus Christ. Please read along with me, John 17:9-21. John 17:9-21, "I ask on their behalf; I do not ask on behalf of the world, but of those whom Thou hast given Me; for they are Thine; and all things that are Mine are Thine, and Thine are Mine; and I have been glorified in them. "And I am no more in the world; and yet they themselves are in the world, and I come to Thee. Holy Father, keep them in Thy name, the name which Thou hast given Me, that they may be one, even as We are. "While I was with them, I was keeping them in Thy name which Thou hast given Me; and I guarded them, and not one of them perished but the son of perdition, that the Scripture might be fulfilled. "But now I come to Thee; and these things I speak in the world, that they may have My joy made full in themselves. "I have given them Thy word; and the world has hated them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. "I do not ask Thee to take them out of the world, but to keep them from the evil one. "They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. "Sanctify them in the truth; Thy word is truth. "As Thou didst send Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world. "And for their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they themselves also may be sanctified in truth. "I do not ask in behalf of these alone, but for those also who believe in Me through their word; that they may all be one; even as Thou, Father, art in Me, and I in Thee, that they also may be in Us; that the world may believe that Thou didst send Me. Amen.
	We have no inheritance in the things of this world. Our complete and full heritage and birthright is set in Jesus Christ. As He is our life, so are we set on the journey that He undertook in this realm. It is a journey to the full glory of God throughout all of His creation. We are in this world for the single reality of proclaiming, in the most living and overcoming certainty, that truth and salvation are found only in Jesus Christ, the Son of God, Who bore our sins upon the cross! 
	In the light of that surety, we are to honor God with the every desire and attitude of our hearts. We cannot seek to please the world and God. That is impossible. We cannot find satisfaction in anything that this age tries to offer as a consolation prize. Everything is unto God Alone as Our Lord so boldly proclaimed in Matt 6:24+25. "No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will hold to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon. "For this reason I say to you, do not be anxious for your life, as to what you shall eat, or what you shall drink; nor for your body, as to what you shall put on. Is not life more than food, and the body than clothing? 
	This conflict came into full view as Pilate examined Our Lord immediately preceding His crucifixion. In the interrogation, Christ announced the veracity of what living unto Him absolutely entailed. John 18:36+37, Jesus answered, "My kingdom is not of this world. If My kingdom were of this world, then My servants would be fighting, that I might not be delivered up to the Jews; but as it is, My kingdom is not of this realm." Pilate therefore said to Him, "So You are a king?" Jesus answered, "You say correctly that I am a king. For this I have been born, and for this I have come into the world, to bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears My voice." 
	The full measure of the truth is highlighted for us by the Apostle Paul in Eph 2:1-7. Eph 2:1-7, And you were dead in your trespasses and sins, in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places, in Christ Jesus, in order that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. Amen.
	God, in His infinite grace and mercy evidenced fully to Abraham all those centuries ago, has so greatly and richly showered upon us His unfathomable love in Jesus Christ. In that perfect love, He has removed from us the chains and the cares of this realm and made us to be part of His heavenly kingdom, filling all creation with His glory and majesty and wisdom. As such, we no longer are to seek those avenues that would once again bind us, in any measure, to the ties of this realm. We are translated, in Jesus Christ, into a new creation, a new heritage, with a new character and completely new state of being and reality. 	
	The Apostle Peter relates this in 1 Peter 2:9-12. 1 Peter 2:9-12, But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God's own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light; for you once were not a people, but now you are the people of God; you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. Beloved, I urge you as aliens and strangers to abstain from fleshly lusts, which wage war against the soul. Keep your behavior excellent among the Gentiles, so that in the thing in which they slander you as evildoers, they may on account of your good deeds, as they observe them, glorify God in the day of visitation. 
	This is not a new message that we have never heard before. Neither is it a great revelation that has just been decreed for us. As we have seen, Jesus Christ declared it verbally while He was still on this earth. Abraham and all the patriarchs truly lived their entire existence as wanderers and sojourners, even while they inhabited the land of promise. Everything has always pointed to the fact that God has far more in mind for us than just living in this physical realm. All has eternally been pointing to and fulfilled in the giving of His Son as the Savior and Lord of all creation. 
	We are called for the purpose of declaring that tremendous truth with confidence and fervor and sincerity and dedication in the passionate embrace that we are not of this world any longer! Our hope and our guarantee of our Heavenly citizenship is set fully and forever in the death and the glorious resurrection of Our Lord Jesus Christ!
	As we consider our place in this world, let it ever be in the light of the truth that is heralded by the Apostle Paul, in terms of how we are to view everything that our earthly life entails. Gal 6:14, But may it never be that I should boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. 
We are to view this world with the vision that perceives far beyond the apparent elements of sight and sound and taste and feel and smell, those earthly faculties of sensory illumination. We are to count on the Holy Spirit to put everything against the measure of the Cross, the death and triumphant resurrection of our Lord. As the world so hated Him, so are we in this realm, hated and despised and ridiculed and abandoned. But, just as with Our Heavenly Father and His Only Begotten Son, we are still to so love the world. We do so with His heart of perfect love in that we are willing to lay down our lives so that those, so lost, can be found and freed from the enslavement of this age. Our lives are to be an ever more purer, living testimony that Jesus Christ is alive and victorious forevermore! Only in Him is found life everlasting! So be it.
	"I am a stranger and a sojourner among you; give me a burial site among you, that I may bury my dead out of my sight." Amen.

This morning’s benediction is Acts 20:32. "And now I commend you to God and to the word of His grace, which is able to build you up and to give you the inheritance among all those who are sanctified. Amen.