The Book of Genesis
Part 25
In our last study we had reached the point where we were ready to look into Abraham’s response to the call of God. It would be well for us to refresh our memories by reading once more the early part of Genesis 12.
In the answer of Abraham to the divine summons we see his perfect confidence in God. We shall see that there were lapses in his life of faith, but hereafter we shall discover him to be characteristicly a man of faith in God. It is as such that he is presented to us in the New Testament.
Let us break down this lesson in order that we not only understand it the better, but in order that we apply it the more readily to our own individual cases. We must ever remember that Abraham, like the other Old Testament worthies, was a man of like passons as we. In first place, we shall look at the
Operation Of Confidence
(Vv. 4-5): “So Abraham departed.” Here we have faith in action. Surely this is the faith commended by James “Seest thou how faith wrought with his works, and by works was faith made perfect” (Jas. 2:22). This is the same type of faith possessed by the young converts at Thessalonica. The commendation of Paul to them might be rendered, “Your operative faith, your labouring love, and your patient hope” (1 Thess. 1:3).
Let us now consider
The Obedience Of Faith (Heb. 11:8-9):
“By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went. By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise.” At the first Abraham’s obedience appeared only to be partial (Gen. 11:31). Full obedience on Abraham’s part is not seen until after the death of his father Terah. It is only when death, the reckoning of ourselves dead with Christ, has taken place, that implicit obedience is possible.
The Outcome Of Confidence (Gen. 12:4):
“And Lot went with him.” Such was the influence of Abraham’s confidence in God, Lot tried to follow his example. We know that he failed, and so must every carnal believer who attempts to walk the path of faith in the energy of the flesh. Nevertheless, it is precious to see how Abraham’s example inspired his nephew to more lofty aims in life. As Lot followed Abraham, the Apostle Paul has exhorted us to follow him, even as he followed Christ. Of elder brethren who have been called home to glory we read, “Remember them … whose faith follow, considering the end of their conversation” (Heb. 13:7). Let us therefore not be slothful, but followers of them who through faith and patience inherit the promises (Heb. 6:12).
The Obligation Of Confidence (Gen. 12:6-9):
Here we have before us three very important matters:
The corruption of faith (V. 6): Abraham passed through the land into the place of Sichem, Sycar, unto the plain (oak) of Moreh (teacher or soothsayer). Apparently under this tree, the terebinth or turpentine tree, the art of divination was practised by the Canaanites. It was the place of fortune-telling, the evil to which man subjects himself when he can no longer trust God and walk by faith. For Abraham it was the end of all that, even as, in a later day, it was for Jacob (Gen. 35:1-4).
The confirmation of faith (V. 7): “The Lord appeared unto Abram.” Here we have the first Theophany recorded in connection with this patriarch. God now appears directly beside the place of idol worship and soothsaying practices as if in open defiance of these works of the devil. In the New Testament (Matt. 16), the Lord Jesus leads His disciples northward to Ceasarea Philippi, and under the very shadow of a shrine to the idol Pan, as if in defiance, declared, “I will build My Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” Here then Abraham’s faith was confirmed in the very place where the devil would have attempted to corrupt it. There are those who consider separation as an isolation, but this is not the circumstance in which faith is tested and tried and proved real and strong. The separation that results in intimate fellowship with God is not one that leads us away from the circumstances of life, but one that enjoys communion with the Lord in the circumstances of life.
Our studies this month would be very incomplete if we did not look at
The confession of faith (Vv. 8-9): “He removed from thence into a mountain on the east of Bethel, and pitched his tent, having Bethel on the west, and Hai on the east: and there he builded an altar unto the Lord, and called upon the name of the Lord. And Abram journeyed, going on still toward the south.”
All this was the direct result of God’s appearing to our patriarch. First he pitched his tent, the tent that tells us of his relationship to the land, he was a stranger in the country, “dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob.” In second place, he raised an altar to the Lord, and the altar manifested his relationship to God and to heaven. He was not only a stranger in the land of promise, but he was a pilgrim on his way through, “He looked for a city which hath foundation, whose builder and maker is God.”
Abraham now had an altar, not an idol. God is spirit, invisible, and intangible, and as our Lord explained to the Samaritan woman at Sychar’s well, the very place where Abraham had his tent and altar at the first (V. 6), the worship of such an One must be spiritual.
May the Lord give to each of His own the grace to respond to the call of the Lord in separation from this poor world, in order that each may live and assume the obligations of faith. Like Abraham we are priests to offer up sacrifices to God continually, giving thanks in His name. Moreover, we are strangers and pilgrims and therefore should abstain from fleshly lusts that war against our souls, and have our manner of life honourable among the Gentiles (Heb. 13:15. 1 Pet. 2:11-12).