Genesis 15
"It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back"
Or
God’s Covenant with Abram
There are many reasons that I feel that I can relate to Abram, just as there are many aspects of Abram’s life that make absolutely no sense to me. That Abram simply packed up the life that he and Sarai created in Ur and Harran without complaining or asking questions of God seems completely out of my realm of understanding. But when Abram asked God how he and Sarai were going to be the progenitors of the great nation that God promised even though Sarai is barren, I can make a connection to something similar in my life. This is what makes the story of Abram and Sarai so compelling – we’ve all been there and we’ve all been them. We’ve all had conversations and interactions with God like the one Abram had in Genesis 15, except that most of us haven’t been made mother and father of a whole nationality, lasting throughout history and extending around the globe. And if you have, let me know because I want to meet you.
God meets Abram in a dream, with God immediately telling him, “Hey! Don’t be afraid! It’s me, God, your shield and the one Who is and give you your great rewards.” What initially is most noticeable here is that God realizes what Abram’s reaction will be upon seeing God in a vision – Abram will be freaked out. God knows that Abram will be scared, so God makes sure that Abram’s fears are allayed.
But surprisingly enough, to me at least, is that Abram doesn’t appear to be scared by God coming to him in a vision. Abram automatically knows what the “reward” is that God is probably talking about – the peopling of Canaan by Abram, Sarai, and their descendents. I would imagine that this specific set of promises of God’s is at the forefront of Abram and Sarai’s minds – they can’t have kids, yet God keeps saying that, somehow, they’ll be the parents of a large number of people.
And of course, with this being on his mind, Abram feels compelled to tell God that, unless God starts fulfilling these promises, Abram’s wealth, property, and influence in the region will pass to his chief servant Eliezer of Damascus. This would be a fairly standard thing to worry about – kings & rulers of various types have worried about who will inherit their stuff for centuries. Someone as wealthy as Abram would want to know exactly what’s going to happen when they pass away, simply because, in most (if not all cultures) of nearly any era throughout world history, people with lots of stuff have lots of influence. Just ask Julius Caesar what happens when you die and your friends have to divide up your empire because they can’t get along and you don’t have any direct descendents to whom you can pass your stuff along.
Yet again, God reaffirms the promises given to Abram, reassuring him that the promises will come to pass. The words God uses to do so are remarkably similar to the ones Abram heard back in Chapters 12 and 13. “Then the word of the Lord came to him: ‘This man [Eliezer] will not be your heir, but a son coming from your own body will be your heir.’ He took him outside and said, ‘Look up at the heavens and count the stars – if indeed you can count them.’ Then he said to him, ‘So shall your offspring be.’ Abram believed the Lord, and he credited it to him as righteousness.” (Genesis 15:4-6, TNIV)
Yeah, I guess I would believe the Lord at this point along with Abram – God has spoken to me three times about how my wife and I would be the parents of a brand-new nation, regardless of her medical condition. Then, Abram did exactly what I would have done: he moved onto a question that he could wrap his mind around. “But Abram said, ‘Sovereign Lord, how can I know that I will gain possession of it?’” (Genesis 15:8, TNIV) He went beyond asking about how these children will be born to him and Sarai to ask God how their kids will actually inhabit this so-called “Promise Land” – a land currently filled with a wide variety of tribes and nations. He has the chutzpah (and this was before Yiddish was even a language!) to ask God how he and his descendents were going to take possession of this land being promised to them.
What else should he have done – continue believing in blind faith? Maybe, but again, I would have had the same issues and asked the same questions. My conversation with God would just have sounded a bit more like this: “OK God, I do believe You when you say that You’re going to heal my wife’s womb and bless us with at least one child so we can start this great people You’ve promised that we’ll start. I do believe that, mostly because that’s a miracle of healing that is truly beyond my human abilities. But this business of taking over a country already filled with people who don’t like me – are You serious about that? How would my family, workers, descendents, and I even begin to attempt that? Do You realize what You’re asking?”
Yeah, that’s what it would sound like. It’s also an introduction to my regular crisis of faith. I can believe God for things beyond my control, but, when God allows me the slightest bit of input and involvement in the events, I just tend to doubt anything and everything. And as great of a man of faith as Genesis, the book of Hebrews, and church history describes Abram/Abraham to have been, I feel that he was a man just like me, a human just like anyone of us. And that’s what is so amazing about the story of Abram, Sarai, and the other patriarchs throughout Genesis.
So, what is God’s response to Abram, yet again, not believing what he’s heard? “So the Lord said to him [Abram], ‘Bring me a heifer, a goat and a ram, each three years old, along with a dove and a young pigeon.’” (Genesis 15:9, TNIV) Abram does this, sacrifices them all by cutting them in two pieces (except for the birds), and sits down to wait. Abram falls asleep after defending the sacrifice from the attacks of the birds of prey (why is this mentioned anyway?).
During this deep and troubled sleep, God goes into great detail concerning the future of Abram’s descendents. Specifically, God talks to Aaron about the 400 years that his people will spend as oppressed foreigners, serving as mistreated slaves in a strange land. We now know this to be the 400 years that the 12 Tribes of Israel lived in Egypt in between the time of Joseph and Moses, between Genesis Chapter 50 and Exodus Chapter 1. But I would imagine that Abram would have been rather saddened upon hearing this.
However, God follows up this negative news by declaring that, even though Abram will not experience the hard life his descendents would, they will still come up out of their oppression to fully take the land that Abram, his immediate family, and his workers never could. This is God’s answer to Abram’s concerns on how the land will be possessed – God will be sending these people through a long bit of suffering and hardship in order to best prepare them spiritually, emotionally, physically, and numerically to conquer and fill the Promised Land. Thus, “On that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram and said, ‘To your descendents I give this land, from the Wadi of Egypt to the great river, the Euphrates – the land of the Kenites, Kenizzites, Kadmonites, Hittites, Perizzites, Rephaites, Amorites, Canaanites, Girgashites and Jebusites.’” (Genesis 15:18-21, TNIV)
Now, leaving all politics aside regarding the contemporary state of Israel and the Palestinians, this is a large swathe of land God is promising to Abram, Sarai, and their progeny. Israel as a nation does come to occupy all of this land during the reigns of David and Solomon, but after the Kingdom was divided between Rehoboam and Jeroboam, Israel was destined to see its borders shrunken, cities assailed, and the both kingdoms occupied, the inhabitants either killed or carted off to Babylon and Assyria. But to Abram, this land and this vision was God’s answer to his doubting and his questions. God knew exactly what Abram would need to see and hear to have faith in God, not that Abram had to know everything, but that God wanted to honor the faith that Abram had already exhibited through his actions so far.
Is it OK to ask questions and display your not-quite-so steady faith to the God you love and believe in? I’d say yes – Abram did.
Teachers: Focus on reading the first 6 verses. These talk specifically about 1) how God came to Abram to talk more about the promises that had already been given, 2) how Abram questioned God about the promises, 3) how God gave answers, 4) the content of those answers, and 5) how Abram came to believe and be praised for his belief. The kids need to understand that God appreciates people coming with their questions – God seeks out people willing to communicate honestly and openly about their unbelief. We see several shining examples throughout the stories, tales, and trials of the patriarchs in Genesis and throughout David’s’ psalms. God does want us to believe and have faith, but God also wants us to talk when we don’t. It’s often in those times that the greatest instruction and discernment comes to us.
Or
God’s Covenant with Abram
There are many reasons that I feel that I can relate to Abram, just as there are many aspects of Abram’s life that make absolutely no sense to me. That Abram simply packed up the life that he and Sarai created in Ur and Harran without complaining or asking questions of God seems completely out of my realm of understanding. But when Abram asked God how he and Sarai were going to be the progenitors of the great nation that God promised even though Sarai is barren, I can make a connection to something similar in my life. This is what makes the story of Abram and Sarai so compelling – we’ve all been there and we’ve all been them. We’ve all had conversations and interactions with God like the one Abram had in Genesis 15, except that most of us haven’t been made mother and father of a whole nationality, lasting throughout history and extending around the globe. And if you have, let me know because I want to meet you.
God meets Abram in a dream, with God immediately telling him, “Hey! Don’t be afraid! It’s me, God, your shield and the one Who is and give you your great rewards.” What initially is most noticeable here is that God realizes what Abram’s reaction will be upon seeing God in a vision – Abram will be freaked out. God knows that Abram will be scared, so God makes sure that Abram’s fears are allayed.
But surprisingly enough, to me at least, is that Abram doesn’t appear to be scared by God coming to him in a vision. Abram automatically knows what the “reward” is that God is probably talking about – the peopling of Canaan by Abram, Sarai, and their descendents. I would imagine that this specific set of promises of God’s is at the forefront of Abram and Sarai’s minds – they can’t have kids, yet God keeps saying that, somehow, they’ll be the parents of a large number of people.
And of course, with this being on his mind, Abram feels compelled to tell God that, unless God starts fulfilling these promises, Abram’s wealth, property, and influence in the region will pass to his chief servant Eliezer of Damascus. This would be a fairly standard thing to worry about – kings & rulers of various types have worried about who will inherit their stuff for centuries. Someone as wealthy as Abram would want to know exactly what’s going to happen when they pass away, simply because, in most (if not all cultures) of nearly any era throughout world history, people with lots of stuff have lots of influence. Just ask Julius Caesar what happens when you die and your friends have to divide up your empire because they can’t get along and you don’t have any direct descendents to whom you can pass your stuff along.
Yet again, God reaffirms the promises given to Abram, reassuring him that the promises will come to pass. The words God uses to do so are remarkably similar to the ones Abram heard back in Chapters 12 and 13. “Then the word of the Lord came to him: ‘This man [Eliezer] will not be your heir, but a son coming from your own body will be your heir.’ He took him outside and said, ‘Look up at the heavens and count the stars – if indeed you can count them.’ Then he said to him, ‘So shall your offspring be.’ Abram believed the Lord, and he credited it to him as righteousness.” (Genesis 15:4-6, TNIV)
Yeah, I guess I would believe the Lord at this point along with Abram – God has spoken to me three times about how my wife and I would be the parents of a brand-new nation, regardless of her medical condition. Then, Abram did exactly what I would have done: he moved onto a question that he could wrap his mind around. “But Abram said, ‘Sovereign Lord, how can I know that I will gain possession of it?’” (Genesis 15:8, TNIV) He went beyond asking about how these children will be born to him and Sarai to ask God how their kids will actually inhabit this so-called “Promise Land” – a land currently filled with a wide variety of tribes and nations. He has the chutzpah (and this was before Yiddish was even a language!) to ask God how he and his descendents were going to take possession of this land being promised to them.
What else should he have done – continue believing in blind faith? Maybe, but again, I would have had the same issues and asked the same questions. My conversation with God would just have sounded a bit more like this: “OK God, I do believe You when you say that You’re going to heal my wife’s womb and bless us with at least one child so we can start this great people You’ve promised that we’ll start. I do believe that, mostly because that’s a miracle of healing that is truly beyond my human abilities. But this business of taking over a country already filled with people who don’t like me – are You serious about that? How would my family, workers, descendents, and I even begin to attempt that? Do You realize what You’re asking?”
Yeah, that’s what it would sound like. It’s also an introduction to my regular crisis of faith. I can believe God for things beyond my control, but, when God allows me the slightest bit of input and involvement in the events, I just tend to doubt anything and everything. And as great of a man of faith as Genesis, the book of Hebrews, and church history describes Abram/Abraham to have been, I feel that he was a man just like me, a human just like anyone of us. And that’s what is so amazing about the story of Abram, Sarai, and the other patriarchs throughout Genesis.
So, what is God’s response to Abram, yet again, not believing what he’s heard? “So the Lord said to him [Abram], ‘Bring me a heifer, a goat and a ram, each three years old, along with a dove and a young pigeon.’” (Genesis 15:9, TNIV) Abram does this, sacrifices them all by cutting them in two pieces (except for the birds), and sits down to wait. Abram falls asleep after defending the sacrifice from the attacks of the birds of prey (why is this mentioned anyway?).
During this deep and troubled sleep, God goes into great detail concerning the future of Abram’s descendents. Specifically, God talks to Aaron about the 400 years that his people will spend as oppressed foreigners, serving as mistreated slaves in a strange land. We now know this to be the 400 years that the 12 Tribes of Israel lived in Egypt in between the time of Joseph and Moses, between Genesis Chapter 50 and Exodus Chapter 1. But I would imagine that Abram would have been rather saddened upon hearing this.
However, God follows up this negative news by declaring that, even though Abram will not experience the hard life his descendents would, they will still come up out of their oppression to fully take the land that Abram, his immediate family, and his workers never could. This is God’s answer to Abram’s concerns on how the land will be possessed – God will be sending these people through a long bit of suffering and hardship in order to best prepare them spiritually, emotionally, physically, and numerically to conquer and fill the Promised Land. Thus, “On that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram and said, ‘To your descendents I give this land, from the Wadi of Egypt to the great river, the Euphrates – the land of the Kenites, Kenizzites, Kadmonites, Hittites, Perizzites, Rephaites, Amorites, Canaanites, Girgashites and Jebusites.’” (Genesis 15:18-21, TNIV)
Now, leaving all politics aside regarding the contemporary state of Israel and the Palestinians, this is a large swathe of land God is promising to Abram, Sarai, and their progeny. Israel as a nation does come to occupy all of this land during the reigns of David and Solomon, but after the Kingdom was divided between Rehoboam and Jeroboam, Israel was destined to see its borders shrunken, cities assailed, and the both kingdoms occupied, the inhabitants either killed or carted off to Babylon and Assyria. But to Abram, this land and this vision was God’s answer to his doubting and his questions. God knew exactly what Abram would need to see and hear to have faith in God, not that Abram had to know everything, but that God wanted to honor the faith that Abram had already exhibited through his actions so far.
Is it OK to ask questions and display your not-quite-so steady faith to the God you love and believe in? I’d say yes – Abram did.
Teachers: Focus on reading the first 6 verses. These talk specifically about 1) how God came to Abram to talk more about the promises that had already been given, 2) how Abram questioned God about the promises, 3) how God gave answers, 4) the content of those answers, and 5) how Abram came to believe and be praised for his belief. The kids need to understand that God appreciates people coming with their questions – God seeks out people willing to communicate honestly and openly about their unbelief. We see several shining examples throughout the stories, tales, and trials of the patriarchs in Genesis and throughout David’s’ psalms. God does want us to believe and have faith, but God also wants us to talk when we don’t. It’s often in those times that the greatest instruction and discernment comes to us.
posted by APN | 7:20 PM
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