Genesis 12:1-9 Pastor Nathan P. Kassulke
Summer Series: Joy for Our Journeys 2 Sunday, July 14, 2019 “The Journey to a Promised Land”
Where are you going? That’s an important question to answer regarding any journey you might wish to take. I suppose that we could wander around a neighborhood without a destination in mind, or travel an unknown road just to find out where it leads. But most often, if we plan to go somewhere, we make all our plans depending on the place where we want to go. So it is unusual and striking when we find a journey like the one we are considering in our sermon today, a journey taken by Abram, later and probably better known as Abraham. When Abram began his journey, he didn’t know where he was going. Instead, God instructed him to set out, and God promised that he would show Abram where to go. And Abram listened. He set off on his journey to a Promised Land, and God blessed that journey. The journey was successful because of God’s great promises and because of God’s great power. Let’s look first at God’s promises to Abram. To really appreciate these promises, let’s back up a little bit and fill in some Bible history leading up to this point. Last week we looked at how Adam and Eve fell into sin and had to make their journey out of the perfect paradise of Eden. God comforted them in that journey with the promise that he would send a Savior to fix the problem of sin. That precious promise was shared with others, with Adam and Eve’s children and grandchildren. Some believed the promise and lived according to it. Others did not. In fact, many others did not. They didn’t listen to God and hold on to the promise. They acted selfishly. Wickedness quite quickly showed itself as Adam and Eve’s own son murdered his brother. That wickedness continued, and it grew. That wickedness so completely infected the world that God made a determination that he would take drastic action. He wiped out wicked mankind with a worldwide flood and saved only Noah and his family, along with a large number of animals, in the giant ark he had built. We might have expected that lesson in God’s punishment and his love would have really made an impact. But within a few generations, wickedness was obvious again. God had directed the people to spread out and to disperse around the world, but they refused. They decided that they would build a tower that could stand as a monument to their glory and ingenuity. Instead, God confused their languages, so that they could not understand each other. One small group of people ended up speaking one language, and they couldn’t understand and work with another group speaking a different language. And this accomplished the purpose God intended and forced the people to disperse around the world. And so we find different people groups, different languages, different cultures, throughout the world. And what happened to God’s promise? Well, when God determined it was time, he repeated it and added detail and clarity. According to his timeline alone, he shared more and more detail about when and where and through whom he would keep his promise. We’ll continue to see that over several weeks of this summer series. In our account today, that promise- the promise of a Savior- was among the promises God gave to Abram. It was one of the promises that led to his journey. Consider the first several verses of our account: Now the LORD said to Abram, “Get out of your country and away from your relatives and from your father’s house and go to the land that I will show you. I will make you a great nation. I will bless you and make your name great. You will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse anyone who dishonors you. All of the families of the earth will be blessed in you.” This would be quite a journey for Abram. He knew right away that he would leave his home. He would leave almost all of his family members, and that was about all he knew. God would clue him in on the destination later. There was precious little that Abram knew about the journey, but he did know the promises of God. In these words from God to Abram, we find at least seven promises concerning the way God would bless Abram. Not only would he bless Abram, God would also bless other through Abram. And ultimately, God’s promise was that he would use Abram to bless “all the families of the earth.”
What a lavish promise this was! A promise that went well beyond Abram’s home or family or lifetime. It was a promise to the whole world, a promise for all time. This was the new version of the same promise once given to Adam and Eve. God had told them that a seed of the woman would be the Savior. God told Abram that the Savior would come from his family line. As if all the other promises were not enough, God would honor Abram in this way! He didn’t deserve it. There was nothing special about Abram. He came from the same lineage of sinners as everyone else in the world. There was nothing about his family or situation that made God choose him. God simply chose him and promised him blessings. And Abram believed. He packed up his possessions, took his household servants, his wife, and his nephew. And he set out. He heard the rich promises of God, and he believed them. He trusted that where God would lead would be the right place for him to be. He trusted that God would do what he said. Abram made the journey to an unknown promised land because of God’s great promises. And God blessed his journey. God brought Abram from Haran to Canaan. Canaan was a crossroads of civilization. It was a fertile land that supported a number of tribes and nations. And Abram lived there in the land in tents knowing that one day, God would bless his descendants so that they would settle there permanently. Abram made the journey not only because of God’s great promises, but also because of God’s great power. Abram was 75 years old when he set out. He had no children, and yet the promise that God gave him spoke about his offspring as a great nation. It was impossible odds. It required amazing confidence. But Abram knew that God loved him and was powerful to keep his promises, so he listened and he went. And God kept every single promise. He gave Abram a son in his old age and despite the advanced age of his wife as well. He settled Abram’s descendants in that same land of Canaan. He made Abram’s descendants into a great nation and blessed Abram in a way that he became the father of many nations. And when the time had come, God blessed all families on earth through Abram’s line. He sent a son of Abram who was also the Son of God. He sent Jesus to live to take away all of Abram’s sins and to die the death that Abram deserved. He blessed Abram ultimately with eternal life. The book of Genesis spends many chapters of the life of Abram, much more than just the little glimpse in today’s sermon. Other places in Scripture also say a great deal about him, like our Second Lesson from Hebrews (11:8-16). There are many lessons to be learned from his life. And there are certainly lessons to be learned from his journey to a promised land. As we hear about the lavish promises that God gave to Abram, we know that he has lavished his grace on us, too. We didn’t earn or deserve it any more than Abram did. There was nothing about us that made God choose us to be his own. In fact, we have often been and have often lived as enemies of God. We have earned and deserved his anger and punishment. But the promise of a Savior, the promise given to Abram, was also for us. Jesus lived and died for you. He rose again to open the door of heaven to you. And along with this good news, God lavishes on us his promises. He promises that he will work all things out for our good. He promises that he will strengthen us through his Word and sacraments. He promises that he will lead us safely to our heavenly home. God’s great promises and God’s great power call forth faith. Just as Abram believed God and listened to his Word, so we ought to joyfully respond by trusting in his promises. Far too often we have refused to listen to his instructions. Far too often we have lived as though God was not in control or didn’t have our best interests at heart. But even more often God showers his love and forgiveness on us. And he invites us to follow him. He invites us to trust. He invites us to expect that he will do the great things that he promises. Indeed, our God is worthy of praise. As he heard God’s promises and saw the promised land for himself, Abram responded by building altars and praising God. Confidence in God’s promises leads us to worship him with our lives of loving service. Where are we going? Thanks to God’s great promises and God’s great power, we confidently continue our journey to our heavenly Promised Land.
The Text: Genesis 12:1-9 EHV Now the LORD said to Abram, “Get out of your country and away from your relatives and from your father’s house and go to the land that I will show you. 2I will make you a great nation. I will bless you and make your name great. You will be a blessing. 3I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse anyone who dishonors you. All of the families of the earth will be blessed in you.” 4So
Abram went, as the LORD had told him. Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran. 5Abram took Sarai his wife, Lot his brother’s son, and all the possessions they had accumulated and the people that they had acquired in Haran, and they set out to travel to the land of Canaan. Eventually they arrived in the land of Canaan. 6Abram passed through the land until he came to the Oak of Moreh at the place called Shechem. The Canaanites were in the land at that time. 7The
LORD appeared to Abram and said, “I will give this land to your descendants.” Abram built an altar there to the LORD, who had appeared to him. 8He
moved on from there to the hill country east of Bethel and pitched his tent there, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east. There he built an altar to the LORD and proclaimed the name of the LORD. 9Then Abram set out and continued toward the Negev.