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PERICOPE STUDY
CENTER FOR THEOLOGY, LRC
Series A for the Second Sunday in Lent
February 20, 2005
“CONSIDER ALL GOD’S BLESSING INVOLVES”
Genesis 12:1-4a
In the three year
cycle, which preceded the present Revised Common Lectionary one, the section of
Scripture considered was Genesis 12:1-8. In
those verses two promises were made to Abram, those delineated, in first four
verses, such as great posterity and great name, but also that of Promised Land
in verse 7.
The salvation story really starts with Chapter 12 of Genesis.
The Bethel Bible Series began at this point with its first lesson.
And probably the point was well made theologically.
The story of the salvation of the world begins in earnest at this point.
Provision of salvation through creation has not worked.
To this day the hope that nature will someday change and lose its
imperfections by natural development has proved a disappointment.
The idea that whatever is natural is good will not fly.
The impossibility of this has been seen in the failure of the solution of
destroying everyone bad and beginning anew with the family of good people.
God has perceived that “the imagination of man’s heart is evil from
his youth,” and what happens after the flood substantiates that.
The only solution possible is provided in a covenant in which God
promises to continue to act for the good of people and they promise to serve
him. He gives this promise to a
single individual, Abram,
but it is a promise to be extended through him to any and all people who will
accept its terms. God’s intention
is not to exclude any people; they will be cut off only at their own request.
It is by sovereign grace the Abram would be groomed for greatness.
This man had done nothing to deserve the Almighty’s mercy and leading.
The purpose of God’s choosing and blessing Abram and his family is not
limited to them but he intends to provide blessing through them to all peoples
on earth. God’s intention is not
fulfilled when all is going well with his people but only when they are proving
to be a blessing to others because they are bringing other people to recognize
God and to find their hope in him and to serve him.
To realize how drastic was the process that was required to mold this
man, before he could possibly be regarded as “Father Abraham”, needs to be
understood.
The separation from Abram’s old life is to be complete. But the tie with the rest of humanity will remain, for Abram
is descended from Noah and from Adam, like everyone else in the story and in the
world. But he is to separate
himself from his country, his people, and the house of his fathers (a narrowing
sequence), and he is to go to a land which Yahweh will show him.
Abram’s responsibility is not to find a place or to produce a family by
his own powers but it is to trust Yahweh and let himself be used and led by him.
The chief calling of God’s people is to listen (shamah also means to obey). It is to let Yahweh be their God in their lives..
The outcome of God’s
working will be blessings and cursing. The
action of God will be a blessing for all who let God have his way in their
lives. Cursing will be the
consequence of standing in God’s way or in the way of his people as they carry
out his directions.
The arrangement of the poetic lines is interesting. The first part of each tells what will happen to Abram and
his family and the second part defines it in terms of blessing or curse.
I will make you a great nation
I will bless you
I will make your name great
You will be a blessing
I will bless those who bless you
I will curse those who curse you
All peoples on earth will be blessed through you
The notion of curse
appears five times in the first eleven chapters of pre-history Genesis!
1. In 3:14 it is the serpent
which is cursed
2.
In 3:17 it is the soil or ground
3. In 4:11 it is Cain, who
killed his brother Abel
4. In 5:29 it is the ground
from which humans had the heavy load of work and painful labor to make
it produce
5. In 9:25 it is Canaan,
Noah’s youngest son
To counterbalance this evil, we can look to the good news of the Old
Testament, as it was actualized in the person who would be designated as
Abraham. Five true titles can be
put to the Hebrew pioneer, who left the land and his people in Old Mesopotamia.
1. Father of a multitude
2.
Prince of God
3.
Prophet
4.
The man in God’s confidence
5.
Servant of the living God
All the life of Abraham was a special training for a special end.
Chosen, as are all God’s instruments, because he was capable of being
made that which the Lord proposed to make him, there was that in him which the
good Spirit of the Lord formed, through the incidents of his life of wandering,
into a character of eminent and single-hearted faithfulness.
This work was done not for his own sake exclusively. He was to be “a father of many generations.”
The seed of Abraham was to be kept separate from the heathen world around
it, even until from it was
produced the “Desire of all nations”; and this character of Abraham was
stamped thus deeply upon him, that it might be handed on through him to his
children and his children’s children after him.
At once you feel the breadth of the spirit of Abraham. Of no narrow-thinking person or bigot would it be said, “By you all the families of the earth shall bless themselves.” The same largeness of spirit is seen in the great Reformer. Luther once said, “My coat of arms shall be a heart that has the color of human flesh upon it, warm with human love, and in it shall be planted the cross, the black cross, that shows the sacredness of sacrificial suffering, and that shall be set in a rose of the purest white - the purity and strength of character that God can give to those that suffer - and back of it all shall be that ground of blue that brings heaven nearer to earth, and around it shall be the golden ring of perfectedness and eternity as a symbol of what Jesus Christ has done for men.”
Pastor
Luther Knauff
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