Genesis 12:1-5
The Lord said to Abram, “Leave your country, your people and your father’s household and go 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.”
So Abram left, as the Lord had told him; and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he set out from Haran. He took his wife Sarai, his nephew Lot, all the possessions they had accumulated and the people they had acquired in Haran, and they set out for the land of Canaan, and they arrived there.
I grew up watching “Star Trek.” No, I wasn’t a “Trekkie”! I didn’t dress up like Captain Kirk or Mr. Spock, but I did watch and can still remember the opening of each week’s episode:
“Space: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Its five-year mission: to explore new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no man has gone before.”
I was part of a whole generation that wondered what it would be like to venture beyond our known world and to explore the mysteries of the universe.
What I didn’t know at the time was that the adventures of Captain Kirk, Spock, Bones and Scotty were actually sci-fi versions of a Biblical mandate that permeates God’s word from cover to cover; the gospel mandate to “go”!
We’ve spent the past 9 months of “10 Minutes with God” studying the gospel. We’ve seen that the gospel is like a finely cut diamond with many facets; each facet as breathtakingly beautiful as the last. We’ve learned that the gospel is a lens through which we can see all of scripture and every area of our lives more clearly.
And now we’re going to see that the gospel has a bias toward action. The gospel, of course, is truth; the good news that God has made his salvation available to us through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. But the gospel is also a power, a force, an energy that insists on radiating out in ever widening circles of influence and impact. The gospel compels those who believe it and experience it toward action.
And that action begins in Genesis with the call of a man named Abram.
The Lord said to Abram, “Leave your country, your people and your father’s household and go to the land I will show you. Genesis 12:1
The first thing I notice is that there are two parts to God’s command to Abram. There is the “leave” part and then there is the “go” part; and both parts are necessary. Notice as well that, on the one hand, Abram knows very little about where he is going. God just says, “…go to the land I will show you.” So Abram is going into the unknown.
But, on the other hand, we can assume that he knows a lot about what he is leaving.
From the context of the previous chapter we know that Abram was born in a place called “Ur of the Chaldeans” which was located in modern day Iraq. Genesis 11 tells us that Abram lived in Ur until he married Sarai, at which time his father Terah packed up the whole family and set out for the land of Canaan; a journey that, if completed, would total about 1000 miles. We learn in Genesis 11:31 that when they arrived at a city called Haran, which is a little over half-way to Canaan, Terah decided to settle the family there.
Scholars don’t know exactly why Terah decided to leave the familiar world of Ur, nor do they know why he decided to stay in Haran instead of completing the journey to the Land of Canaan. But we do know that, upon his father’s death, Abram heard the call of God and continued the journey to Canaan.
Now, what do we know about the world Abram was asked to leave behind? Ur of the Chaldeans was one of the great cities of the ancient world. It was one of the economic and religious centers of Mesopotamian culture from roughly 3000 B.C. to about the 4th century B.C. when the course of the Euphrates river changed significantly, causing the city to be abandoned.
Haran, which was located in what is now southeastern Turkey, would have been very similar to Ur.
These cities were relatively affluent and typically poly-theistic; dominated by pagan shrines and idolatry of all kinds. Life for Abram in both Ur and Haran would likely have been somewhat comfortable and secure.
Then God says, “Leave…and go.”
Before we look at why God called Abram to leave and go, let’s think for a moment about all the ways that this pattern plays out in our lives.
Our lives can be seen as a long series of decisions, or passages, where we leave and go. Before we go to the next school, the next job, the next house or the next town in our lives, we first have to leave the old school, job, house or town.
It’s true even in our faith.
When we turn toward Christ for salvation, we turn away everything else we once looked to for security and hope. When we follow Christ in obedience, we turn our backs on habits and behaviors that are contrary to that obedience.
So as we begin our study of the man named Abram (soon to be “Abraham”), we must see that the central issue is not Ur or Haran or even Canaan. The central issue is God’s promise of blessing. God told Abram quite clearly that the reason for his call to “leave and go” was that through Abram all the peoples of the earth would be blessed. God was talking about the gospel, of course; the gospel that would eventually offer salvation to the world through Jesus Christ.
So Abram doesn’t know much about where he’s going, but he does know why he is going: God wants to bless the world through him.
And that blessing will be the direct result of his own obedience to God’s call on his life. And the center of obedience is trust.
In Hebrews 11 we read:
By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going.
Lord,
Thank you for the story of Abram and your call on his life. We are the beneficiaries of the blessing of the gospel that you promised to him so long ago! Teach us to hear your voice and teach us to be willing to obey your call to share the blessing of the gospel, even when we can’t see clearly where we are going!
Pastor Brian Coffey
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