Genesis 15:1 Afterwards Jehovah spoke to Abram in a vision, and this is what he told him: “Don’t be fearful, Abram, for I will defend you. And I will give you great blessings.”
2-3 But Abram replied, “O Lord Jehovah, what good are all your blessings when I have no son? For without a son, some other member of my household will inherit all my wealth.”
4 Then Jehovah told him, “No, no one else will be your heir, for you will have a son to inherit everything you own.”
5-7 Then God brought Abram outside beneath the nighttime sky and told him, “Look up into the heavens and count the stars if you can. Your descendants will be like that—too many to count!” And Abram believed God; then God considered him righteous on account of his faith.
And he told him, “I am Jehovah who brought you out of the city of Ur of the Chaldeans, to give you this land.”
8 But Abram replied, “O Lord Jehovah, how can I be sure that you will give it to me?”
Pretend you are Abram. You moved from Haran when you were seventy-five, and now you are getting older. Your wife is also getting older; in fact, she hasn’t menstruated in years. You have no children and are beginning to resign yourself to taking one of your chief servants as your heir. But God keeps promising you that He will bless you abundantly. And now God says that your descendants will be as numerous as the stars and that He is going to give you all the land you have seen. At this point, nobody will criticize you for wondering how God proposes to fulfill His promises. “But Abram replied, “O Lord Jehovah, how can I be sure that you will give it to me?” What the Bible doesn’t record, but what Abram actually asks is, “Lord, are You kidding???”
God knows Abram’s heart, and God knows there’s one way He can graphically demonstrate that He’s serious about these promises. In Abram’s time, men entering serious contracts “cut covenant,” slaughtering animals and then walking around and between the carcasses while chanting promises that this same fate will overtake them and their animals if they fail to keep their part of the bargain. Now God cuts covenant with Abram.
9-11 Then Jehovah told him to take a three-year-old heifer, a three-year-old female goat, a three-year-old ram, a turtledove, and a young pigeon, and to slay them and to cut them apart down the middle, and to separate the halves, but not to divide the birds. And when the vultures came down upon the carcasses, Abram shooed them away.
12 That evening as the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram, and a vision of terrible foreboding, darkness, and horror.
13-16 Then Jehovah told Abram, “Your descendants will be oppressed as slaves in a foreign land for 400 years. But I will punish the nation that enslaves them, and at the end they will come away with great wealth. (But you will die in peace, at a ripe old age.) After four generations they will return here to this land; for the wickedness of the Amorite nations living here now will not be ready for punishment until then.”
17-21 As the sun went down and it was dark, Abram saw a smoking firepot and a flaming torch that passed between the halves of the carcasses. So that day Jehovah made this covenant with Abram: “I have given this land to your descendants from the Wadi-el-Arish to the Euphrates River. And I give to them these nations: Kenites, Kenizzites, Kadmonites, Hittites, Perizzites, Rephaim, Amorites, Canaanites, Girgashites, Jebusites.”
Well, after such a graphic demonstration of God’s intent, Abram and his wife Sara should be completely reassured and willing to wait for God’s perfect provision. WRONG! Even though God manifests His power by a smoking firepot and a flaming torch, this couple still doubts. As we learn in Genesis 16, Sara particularly feels God knows some help and takes matters into her own hands.
Why doesn’t Abram believe God and take comfort in His promises? And why doesn’t Abram share his experiences with his wife so that she will be comforted as well? Consider this: Abram wants to believe but he keeps looking at his circumstances. Perhaps Abram does try to tell Sara, but Sara refuses to believe him.
How many times has God tried to comfort us, only for us to refuse to believe Him? Take, for example, God’s admonitions for us not to be afraid. The Bible contains at least 300 commands saying “don’t be afraid.” (The exact number is in dispute, even though popularly some preachers teach that there is one of these commands for each day of the year.) God keeps telling us not to be afraid and we keep clutching our fears.
I love white water canoeing and kayaking. One of the first lessons kayakers must learn is to look at the river and not at the rocks. The second a kayaker begins looking at the rocks, the kayak will wind up on the rocks. We go where we focus. If we are to receive God’s comfort, we must focus on His comfort and His Word, not on the things that terrify us. As we begin this new year, let’s remember God’s promises and the way He has kept us through the previous year. Let’s accept God’s comfort and trust His Word.
PRAYER: Father God, thank You for loving us and caring for us. Lord, help us to trust You and Your promises and Your provision. In the mighty and precious Name of King Jesus. Amen.
Burunche's Blog 
Leave a comment