Abraham A Journey Of Faith, And Ours As Heirs Of The Promise. Series

Abraham a journey of faith, and ours as heirs of the promise.

The thing with Abraham and his journey of faith was that it was just that. A journey of faith.

God had told Abraham when he was still Abram, yip before the name change this: Check out Genesis 12 verses 2-3.

“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 the peoples on earth will be blessed through you.”

When he makes his covenant with Abraham at the time of the name change. God tells Abraham, “No longer will you be called Abram, your name will be Abraham, for I have made you a father of many nations.” Genesis 17:5 God also told Abraham that he would get, “the whole land of Cannan, where you are now an alien, I will give you as an everlasting possession to you and your descendants after you, and I will be their God.”

So at the time of the covenant, Abraham had God’s promise that he would be the father of nations. He already had one son with his wife's maidservant Hagar, the son’s name was Ishmael, and then Abraham had the word from God that he would have a son by Sarah his wife and the boy’s name was to be Isaac. This occurred when Abraham was ninety-nine years old.

Now we had the whole epic of Isaac’s near-death experience covered by Dr Stephen last week. So, the thing that I want to focus on this week is that passage about the land that Abraham and his descendants would receive from God as an “everlasting possession” and how this relates to the faith of the man and the faith of some who would come after him.

If you recall the passage about Lot and Abraham going their separate ways in Genesis thirteen. And after Lot chose the land in the Jordan Valley that looked really impressive as it was green and fertile. After Lot went down into the Jordan and settled his tents near Sodom, The Lord said to Abraham “Lift your eyes from where you are and look North and South, east and west. All the land that you see I will give you and your offspring forever. I will make your offspring like the dust of the earth, so that if anyone could count the dust, then your offspring could be counted. Go walk through the length and breadth of the land, for I am giving it to you.” (Genesis 13:14-17).

In chapter 15 we have God enter into a covenant with Abraham, I won’t read it all but animals cut in half, a heifer, ram and a goat plus a whole dove and a young pigeon also sacrificed. God says to Abraham, after he has complained that one of his servants will inherit all his worldly goodies because he and Sarah don’t have any kids. God says no, you will have descendants as many as the stars you can count in the sky, for this happened at night, shows the value of not watching tele or at least going outside for a look at the stars. Note “Abraham believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness.” This is important to remember.

God tells him, and there’s a bit of the Moffatt paraphrase here; that he was brought out of Ur of the Chaldeans to be given the land of Canan and take possession of it. Abraham says, “Lord how can that happen.” You were probably wondering that yourselves. God gives Abraham a heads up on how this will happen. Verse 13-15; Then the Lord said to him, “Know for certain that for four hundred years your descendants will be strangers in a country not their own and that they will be enslaved and mistreated there. But I will punish the nation they serve as slaves, and afterward they will come out with great possessions. You, however, will go to your ancestors in peace and be buried at a good old age. In the fourth generation your descendants will come back here, for the sin of the Amorites has not yet reached its full measure.” if we look at verse 17 of chapter 15, the sun is setting and the halves of the animals have a smoking fire pot and torch (Indicating Gods presence, pass between them. This was a sign of God’s covenant with Abraham, this was a covenant that would occur between kings of that time and “That was the ancient practice of karath beriyth. You didn’t even need to say anything. You could have had two nations that didn’t speak each other’s language and if... two kings simply walked in between the split carcasses it was understood that they made a covenant (of peace).” genesis - Why does God tell Abram to bring THESE animals? - Biblical Hermeneutics Stack Exchange, What God was saying in this act, was, if I don’t keep my word, may what happen to these animals happen to me. Chapter15 is wound up with God saying “To your descendants I will give this land, then there is a big list of all the ‘ites’ whose land it currently was. God sees the whole picture; in the chapter we see that something was happening between God and the Amorite people regarding their sin and that is why the four-hundred year wait. But in all this God was faithful to his promises as four hundred years Moses led the Israelites, a name they didn't get for another two patriarchs, out of slavery in Egypt and Josuah led them into the Promised Land, a name that Israel is still referred to as.