Day 5: The Promise
”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.”
Genesis 12:3
School holidays were always the focal point of my annual calendar when I was young. Particularly, the long summer season. I’d spend the majority of my precious time primarily driving my mum to distraction, whatever time left, was spent playing football and camping. We kicked footballs around all day then my evenings were spent pitching canvas homes where we’d spend the night.
We didn’t venture too far in our makeshift self-catering hotels. My little gang of friends and yours truly, taking turns using our exotic back gardens. Obviously, the use of these premises solely depended on how demented parents had been driven during daylight hours. Nonetheless, we had endless fun manoeuvring from garden to garden and pitching our mobile home.
In Genesis 12, God calls Abraham to manoeuvre his tent. Not from garden to garden, but to a land that was not his own. He was to leave his country, kindred and father’s house. He had to leave behind everything he knew. Precious home comforts where to be left in Haran. Now it’s one thing for my cronies and I to move a mobile-home around as children, quite another for a 75-year-old pensioner to emigrate to another country. What’s more mind-boggling, Abraham had no clue of his final destination as the LORD hadn’t yet made it known. All he had to go on was “I will” promises from the LORD.
“I will make of you a great nation (v2).”
“I will bless you and make your name great (v2).”
“I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonours you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed (v3).”
The LORD’s “I will” promises to Abraham testify to a universal blessing through him. He will play a key role in the divine scheme of redemption. Sadly, at the ripe old age of 75, blessings he will not live to see. From our Christian vantage point, we can read how it all unfolds. Many generations from Abraham Christ would be born. The Saviour who would save His people from their sin. This was undisclosed to Abraham. However, he was obedient to the call and left the known for the unknown. Through the obedience of one man, made possible the beginning of God’s cosmic plan of salvation.
As we approach Christmas and celebrate this coming King, He also calls us to continue His cosmic salvation plan. The call? To be His witnesses “in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth (Acts 1:8).” We have a role to play in God’s grand story. Like Abraham, we’ve no idea how it will all work out. Yet our call is to be obedient and reap blessings that will last for eternity.
“Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life. (Mark 10:29-30)”
Written by Paul McLaughlin
A Thought to Remember: We have a part to play in God’s redemptive plan.
A Bit More to Read: Genesis 12:1-9
A Question to Ask: In what areas are you not being obedient to the call of the King?
A Song to Sing: In The Bleak Midwinter
A Picture for the kids: Tent