The Call of Abram
Notes
Transcript
Today we begin a study in the Life of Abram, eventually known as Abraham. Were going to look at a a man , that at times, had great faith, but also at times, had little faith. Maybe you can Identify with that dichotomy in your life. I know that I can.
In the first few chapters of Genesis we move rather quickly from creation to Noah to the Tower of Babel about 4000 years. Now the book of Genesis slows down to focus on Abraham and his descendants.
In order to get the most out of the account of Abraham. We must remember the purpose of God in recording his life. God is correcting the narrative of Israel as they have come out of Egypt and establishing a history of God’s faithfulness to them through his preservation of a line and a people.
In essence God is showing them that he has always had a plan. That His plans always come to fruition. So if your an Israelite standing listening to Joshua after the death of Moses saying Choose this day whom you will serve. This narrative gives you hope and a confidence that the promise-land is indeed secured. It is a victory that has already been given. These accounts explain why the people of Israel are the remnant that God has chosen to accomplish his works in the middle of the corrupt son’s of gods territory. Just like he did in Exodus when he pronounced he was making war against the gods of Egypt, he was now making war against the gods of Canaan. Children of Israel this is your story and this is your God.
In this account we must remember the promise of Gen. 3:15
I will put hostility between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring. He will strike your head, and you will strike his heel.
The call of Abraham is the beginning of this promise. The accounts that we just studied are the background to this beginning. God has preserved a remnant and now is separating a people for himself.
Just like many of these narratives, it starts with a family tree.
These are the family records of Terah. Terah fathered Abram, Nahor, and Haran, and Haran fathered Lot.
Haran died in his native land, in Ur of the Chaldeans, during his father Terah’s lifetime.
Abram and Nahor took wives: Abram’s wife was named Sarai, and Nahor’s wife was named Milcah. She was the daughter of Haran, the father of both Milcah and Iscah.
Sarai was unable to conceive; she did not have a child.
Terah took his son Abram, his grandson Lot (Haran’s son), and his daughter-in-law Sarai, his son Abram’s wife, and they set out together from Ur of the Chaldeans to go to the land of Canaan. But when they came to Haran, they settled there.
Terah lived 205 years and died in Haran.
I brought up a map so that you can see where these two cities are in reference to the Mediterranean sea. Most likely the city of Ur mentioned in this passage was part of Babylon.
In fact, they have found the remains of yet another ziggurat type structure built in the ancient city of Ur dedicated to the moon god. In fact, Islam has it roots in this cult religion as well. Thus the symbol of the crescent moon.
Isn’t interesting that God would call an idolatrous man from a city associated with the third great rebellion of the Tower of Babel and use Him for his purposes but what we will see today is that this passage is not really about a man. It’s about a God who will accomplish all that He wills.
The Lord said to Abram: Go from your land, your relatives, and your father’s house to the land that I will show you.
I will make you into a great nation, I will bless you, I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.
I will bless those who bless you, I will curse anyone who treats you with contempt, and all the peoples on earth will be blessed through you.
So Abram went, as the Lord had told him, and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he left 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. When they came to the land of Canaan,
Abram passed through the land to the site of Shechem, at the oak of Moreh. (At that time the Canaanites were in the land.)
The Lord appeared to Abram and said, “To your offspring, I will give this land.” So he built an altar there to the Lord who had appeared to him.
From there he moved on to the hill country east of Bethel and pitched his tent, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east. He built an altar to the Lord there, and he called on the name of the Lord.
Then Abram journeyed by stages to the Negev.
Now most times when I have heard this text covered the main theme of the message goes something like this: Abraham follows God with unquestioning obedience; We need to be like Abraham. While this is true to some degree. Later on in the account of Abrahams life we see that he does struggle with the plan of God, The focus of this passage isn’t Abram or even his obedience.
It’s about the goodness of God in fulfilling all that he promised to do. We are going to see this very thing in the.....
I. The Call of Abram.
I. The Call of Abram.
The Lord said to Abram: Go from your land, your relatives, and your father’s house to the land that I will show you.
The First thing that I want you to notice is that God did not call Abram because he was a righteous man. Unlike Noah there is no mention of Abram walking with God.
Joshua said to all the people, “This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: ‘Long ago your ancestors, including Terah, the father of Abraham and Nahor, lived beyond the Euphrates River and worshiped other gods.
Abraham came from a line of that worshipped other Gods. In fact, nowhere in the text are we given any information about Abram, his background or even if he knew of Yahweh.
Yet God in his grace called Abram, not because Abram was good but because God is good.
If you had a neighbor that worships other gods would you expect God to call, transform and use them? In fact all around us we have people that worship other gods. Jehovah’s witnesses, Mormons, Islam, New agers, and occultist. Do we see a God that is powerful enough to change them? Have we forgotten that we have a God that loves to do impossible things?
The next thing that I want you to notice is not only is God good. He loves to do his work in impossible situations.
II. God of Impossible Promises
II. God of Impossible Promises
Promise # 1
Promise # 1
I will make you into a great nation, I will bless you, I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.
So God gives Abraham this massive promise. I’m going to make you into a great nation.
The problem with this promise begins with what we know about Abram and his wife Sarai.
Sarai was unable to conceive; she did not have a child.
She is advanced in years and is baron or childless. I don’t know about you but this is a pretty big barrier. How can Abram’s line become great if his wife is unable to conceive? We will see in the next couple of weeks that Abram and Sarai wrestle with this very same idea.
Yet we have the God that can make good on impossible promises. He works in the impossible spaces.
The Lord said to Abram: Go from your land, your relatives, and your father’s house to the land that I will show you.
Now if your going to make a person into a great nation do you first make them landless and family less. God literally said Abram I’m going to make you great but before I do. I’m going to take just about everything from you.
Do you see how ludicrous this promise sounds?
But we have a God that can make good on Impossible Promises.
Promise # 2
Promise # 2
I will bless those who bless you, I will curse anyone who treats you with contempt, and all the peoples on earth will be blessed through you.
In this time in history your family was your protection. Especially if you were traveling through a land that was not your own. Without your clan you were vulnerable to attack.
Yet God promises that he will bless Abram and curse anyone that stands in his way.
So to Summarize:
God told Abram leave your land, your clan, and travel to some nondescript location that I will show you once you arrive and through your journey to this hidden place, you and you aged Childless wife will become a mighty nation and bless the entire world.
There are almost to many contradictions to count.
Yet, we have a God that can make good on Impossible Promises.
Promise #3
Promise #3
So Abram went, as the Lord had told him, and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he left 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. When they came to the land of Canaan,
Abram passed through the land to the site of Shechem, at the oak of Moreh. (At that time the Canaanites were in the land.)
The Lord appeared to Abram and said, “To your offspring, I will give this land.” So he built an altar there to the Lord who had appeared to him.
So the childless, Clanless, and landless descendants of Abram would somehow claim an entire region filled with people and fortified citiy-states.
Yet we have a God that makes good on impossible promises. A God that loves to work in the impossible to show His power.
Are you picking up on a theme here?
Well come back to that idea in just a minute but I also want to point out something that Abram does.
Abram passed through the land to the site of Shechem, at the oak of Moreh. (At that time the Canaanites were in the land.)
The Lord appeared to Abram and said, “To your offspring, I will give this land.” So he built an altar there to the Lord who had appeared to him.
The oak of Moreh was known as the “diviners” Oak in other words it was a place of occult worship and practice. It was a land claimed for another god.
Yet In the midst of this place Abram worships the Lord, builds an alter, and claims this place for Yahweh God. In the spiritual realm this was an act of war an invasion if you will.
But when God chose Israel as his portion, they were to be a light to the world. They would invade the spaces of other gods and Yahweh would prove his superiority over them time and time again.
We see Abram do this again....
From there he moved on to the hill country east of Bethel and pitched his tent, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east. He built an altar to the Lord there, and he called on the name of the Lord.
Then Abram journeyed by stages to the Negev.
Abram we claiming this land in the name of The Lord.
I think if we were honest, this morning, many of us would admit that our view of God is rather small.
We have forgotten that Yawheh God is the God of Abram, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph. He is the God of Moses and Joshua. The same God. He is the God that can and does do impossible things.
There is an interesting passage in scripture....
Now faith is the reality of what is hoped for, the proof of what is not seen.
For by this our ancestors were approved.
By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was made from things that are not visible.
By faith Abel offered to God a better sacrifice than Cain did. By faith he was approved as a righteous man, because God approved his gifts, and even though he is dead, he still speaks through his faith.
By faith Enoch was taken away, and so he did not experience death. He was not to be found because God took him away. For before he was taken away, he was approved as one who pleased God.
Now without faith it is impossible to please God, since the one who draws near to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.
By faith Noah, after he was warned about what was not yet seen and motivated by godly fear, built an ark to deliver his family. By faith he condemned the world and became an heir of the righteousness that comes by faith.
By faith Abraham, when he was called, obeyed and set out for a place that he was going to receive as an inheritance. He went out, even though he did not know where he was going.
By faith he stayed as a foreigner in the land of promise, living in tents as did Isaac and Jacob, coheirs of the same promise.
For he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose architect and builder is God.
As you can see we have been walking through Hebrews 11 but what I really want us to focus on is Verse 1
Now faith is the reality of what is hoped for, the proof of what is not seen.
I want you to notice something with me. I think often times we think faith believing in an outcome. Because we cannot visualize a solution we think that we have no faith. But this scripture tells us that none of these individuals could visualize a solution, “it was not seen”. Everyone of these accounts in scripture were impossible. There were no earthly solutions to be seen. That is the point....
We have a God that does the impossible. That thrives in the impossible. When there is no solution, God does....
So having enough faith has nothing to do with being able to visualize a solution and believing it will come to pass.
Then what is faith?
Hebrews 11:3 tells us
By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was made from things that are not visible.
God does the impossible. He works outside of your ability to see. Faith is nothing more than believing in the nature and character of God.
So what are you not asking God for because you cannot visualize an impossible solution or outcome?
Maybe its the salvation of neighbor or family member who is so far from God and you don’t see a solution.
Maybe its your marriage that you have stopped praying for God to heal because its impossible.
Maybe its a health issue or just a life circumstance that has no possible solution.
We have a God that thrives in the impossible......
A God that makes good on impossible promises. A God that loves to work in the impossible to show His glory.
Faith is not believing in a solution. It’s believing in God.