Part 1 - Genesis 12:1-20 (NASB) - OK, HE’S DEAD. WHAT HAVE I INHERITED?
I understand the upheaval of moving to a different city. Packing endless boxes of books, dismantling beds and throwing out all the junk we have accumulated over time - big job. Then watching a huge truck back into our driveway, and take it all away. We have done all that many times in our lives and more recently when we moved to Sydney from the Whitsundays. But that was just from one state to the next. I can’t imagine moving to a different country. Australia is my home.
I was speaking to an English couple who had moved to Australia recently. They spoke about the trauma of uprooting yourself from your country, your relatives, friends and your home. It extracts a huge chunk of your emotional well-being, which like other household items, has to be packed in a box and left to deal with at the other end of the journey. You’ll deal with it then, but please, not now!
We all know of Abraham and how he moved. Pastor Jack McDonald asked us the other day "WHO KNOWS THE NAME OF ABRAHAM’S FATHER?" I thought it was a trick question at first but only one person seemed to have heard of TERAH.
Terah! That would be a good name for me at present. I always have to play the bad guy with my grandson. He is always the super hero and I am the one he defeats. I need a name like Terah! It just sounds like the name of a bad guy. Either that or a Doris Day song "HEY TERAH, TERAH". What do you mean you don’t know who Doris Day was? Anyway, Terah was Abraham’s father. And by the way, just for the record, Terah didn’t name his son "Abraham" but "Abram".
Terah had another son called HARAN (strange names in the Bible). Haran died while visiting his father in Ur. We don’t know the circumstances, but Terah must have been devastated. It seems to have spurred Terah to leave Ur permanently. Maybe the circumstances of Haran’s death were suspicious and demanded that he leave town with all his family. Haran could have done some bad business deals with the mafia in Ur and ended up dead.
For whatever reason, Terah wanted to get out of town. Did God tell him to go. No! Terah didn’t know God. We know that Ur was a spiritually corrupt city, from Joshua 24:2 (NLT) "Joshua said to 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 they worshiped other gods." But even in Ur God was prompting Abram, Terah’s other son, to go to Canaan (See Acts 7:2-3), so this is probably what spurred Terah on.
For some reason when Terah decided to leave Ur he travelled firstly to his dead son’s town. It seems that Haran had named the town after himself and I can imagine Terah, in his grief, coming to this place. Memories of his son would have been heavy on his heart and perhaps it was this that changed his plans. He decided to stay in Haran. He took over Haran’s house. Maybe he was caring for Haran’s wife and daughter, Iscah. Maybe Haran had extensive property investments. The town was named after him, so he must have been wealthy.
For whatever reason, Terah didn’t continue his journey to Canaan. This was Abram’s destiny, and not his. God didn’t ask Terah to go to Canaan in the first place. Abram, his son, certainly was called by God again to continue on to the land of Canaan while he was in Haran.
When my dad died, I inherited a tap (faucet) collection! Brass taps! I’ve never heard of someone who collects taps. Every shape and variety of brass taps. They were too heavy to put them in my suitcase so I placed them in a carry-on-bag as I went to the airport. My bag was taken through the X-ray machine a number of times, and there was a little commotion as some seriously heavy looking guys in uniforms asked me to open the bag. It occurred to me that taps look very much like guns in a carry-on-bag and I’m sure they expected an arms cache and that I was trying to smuggle illegal weapons to a gang in the Whitsundays. I smiled and explained that my dad had just died and that this was my inheritance. Surprisingly, they let me through with my taps. Not a single weapon was fired on the plane.
Abram had decided to stay in Haran until the time came to bury his father. This meant that the inheritance of Terah’s considerable estate was now his. Abraham was a rich man, (but he didn’t have taps). Some criticize him for staying in Haran saying that he fell short of the promises of God, distracted by the attraction of wealth.
Perhaps Jesus was thinking of Abram years hence when one of His disciples came to Him and said, "Lord, first let me return home and bury my father." But Jesus told him, "Follow me now. Let the spiritually dead bury their own dead." (Matthew 8:21-22 NLT). In other words let those who are non-Christians take care of the affairs of the estate, and trust Me for your inheritance and provision.
Just like Abram, God is calling me and all who follow Christ, not to covet and treasure the things that are valued by the world but begin to treasure what God is saying to your life. That will demand some kind of sacrifice. I let go of some things in order to take hold other things which I value more. I can’t afford to hold on too tightly to any of my possessions. Sure, they have some importance, but only when they are submitted to God and His purposes for my life.
Like Abram, I have taken hold of a new citizenship, a new language, a new culture, with new laws. It is the currency of heaven and the customs of God’s culture that I am learning. My behavior has changed. I have separated myself from my old country to embrace my new countries values. I am part of a new family.
1 John 2:15-17 (NLT) says it this way, "Do not love this world nor the things it offers you, for when you love the world, you do not have the love of the Father in you. For the world offers only a craving for physical pleasure, a craving for everything we see, and pride in our achievements and possessions. These are not from the Father, but are from this world. And this world is fading away, along with everything that people crave. But anyone who does what pleases God will live forever."
Romans 12:2 (NLT) says, "Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect."
Colossians 3:2-3 (NLT) says, "Think about the things of heaven, not the things of earth. For you died to this life, and your real life is hidden with Christ in God."
God bless you Church as you "Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and He will give you everything you need." (Matthew 6:33 (NLT)
Pastor Ross
