GENESIS 12 - 16
We see from Genesis 11:31 that Abram and his family were originally from Ur, a place
located in what is today southeastern Iraq. They had previously moved up to
Haran, which was, by established roads, on its way to Canaan. Abram's father, Terah,
had intended to go all the way into Canaan, but stopped short in Haran. It was
there that Abram gets the call from God in verses 1-3. Over the next 5
chapters there is a considerable expansion of detail. First of all, Abram is told to leave his home
and family, pack up and head southwest to a yet-undisclosed land. That, in
itself, took faith. He is told that out of him will come a great nation who
will, in turn, be a blessing to many others. Now here's the really awesome part
in verse 3, "And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that
curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed."
That's a significant promise packed with implications. It becomes the core of w
The destination was
Canaan. This land was inhabited
by the descendants of Ham's son, Canaan, who had moved there after the
dispersion following the debacle at Babel. This land would later become the
nation of Israel. Abram was a descendant of Shem. Upon arrival, Abram gets this
word from God in 12:7, "And the LORD appeared unto Abram, and said, Unto
thy seed will I give this land:" That settles it; this land now officially
belongs to the descendants of Abram, not the Canaanites. Abram was 75 years old
when he took off for Canaan, and he took his nephew, Lot, with him.
One little lie shouldn't be a problem; should it? (Genesis
12:10-20) Abram ran into a little difficulty when the
land experienced famine, so he decided to pack up and head to Egypt for some
relief. One problem though - he was afraid for his life if the Egyptians
thought Sarah was his wife. Sixty-five year-old Sarah must have been a very
attractive woman. What was he thinking when he introduced her as his sister?
We see in Genesis 11:28-29 that she was his half sister…same father,
different mother. But first and foremost
she was his wife. Well, the inevitable happened; she was a hit in Egypt and was
invited to live in Pharaoh's house - what a life! Abram prospered in Egypt, but
then the bad news in verse 12:17, "And the LORD plagued Pharaoh and his house
with great plagues because of Sarai, Abram’s wife." So, Abram, kicked
out of Egypt!
We shouldn't try to
sugar coat Abraham's actions in this passage. He did what he did. The fact is,
Abraham lacked the faith that his God, Who had made him a promise of prosperity
in verses 1-3, could follow through and deliver him safely through the famine.
However, Abraham grows in his relationship with Jehovah God by the time we get
to Genesis 22. At that point in time, he is fully prepared to
follow through with God's command to sacrifice Isaac because he was completely
certain of God's promise to provide descendants through Isaac. Abram is an
example of faith growing through experience.
Perhaps Egypt is where
Hagar joins Abraham's entourage. She was undoubtedly one of the
"maidservants" seen here in verse 16.
An accumulation of
wealth became a problem for Abram and Lot as they moved back to Canaan; their
people didn't get along and the time came to split up. Abram gave Lot the
choice, and Lot chose the really nice land east toward the Jordan River. Sodom
and Gomorrah were located in his choice! - already known for their
wickedness (verse 13). Abram chose to stay around Bethel where he had
originally built the altar upon arrival into Canaan. Bethel remained the
let's-get-back-to-God location for the Hebrews for centuries after this.
After Lot's departure,
God spoke to Abram once again regarding his legacy. “Look around Abram; all of
this land belongs to you.” Here's a particularly significant promise included
Gen. 13:16, "And I will make thy seed as the dust of the earth: so that
if a man can number the dust of the earth, then shall thy seed also be
numbered." Whoa! That's a lot of seed! The Apostle Paul makes a
Messianic point about this seed in Galatians 3:16 Abram left Bethel and made a move south about 30
miles to Hebron. That's about 20 miles south of Jerusalem, the city that would
later become the capital of Israel under King David.
Abram gets pulled into
regional warfare (Genesis 14:1-16)
What pulls Abram into
this battle is the capture of Lot (verse 12). Abraham as many of us would say, Don't
mess with my kin! From among his servants, he raised a substantial army and
defeated the confederate forces of four warring factions, won the release of
his nephew, and he saved Sodom and Gomorrah while he's at it. Don't let the
word "king" here give you a false impression. The Hebrew word
translated "king" is simply the most common word for chief magistrate
and is similar in meaning to several other words usually translated "lord,
captain, ruler, prince, chief" and such like. If a man ruled over a city
with 200 or 300 people, he called himself their king. Abram rounded up 318 of his
"trained" servants and won Lot's release...and he took a nice spoil
from the battle as well.
Enter: Melchizedek
(Genesis 14:17-24)
Abram had a special
visitor after his victory in winning the release of Lot against the aggressive
kings. You will notice that Abram tithes to this person, and notice his
description in verse 18, "he was the priest of the most high God."
Melchizedek was more than just a person; he was the incarnation of Jesus
himself. Abram declines to accept the offer from the King of Sodom to retain
the rescued spoil which had belonged to Sodom.
That "seed"
issue comes up again (Genesis 15:1-6)
Abram wanted a
child! Abram has another talk with God
and God makes him a promise in Gen. 15:5, "And he brought him forth
abroad, and said, Look now toward heaven, and tell the stars, if thou be able
to number them: and he said unto him, So shall thy seed be." Actually,
that's a repeat of a previous promise (Genesis 13:14-18, but this time Abram fully embraces it when it is said of him in
Gen. 15:6, "And he believed in the LORD; and he counted it to him for
righteousness." That's the definition of saving faith - a believing
covenant relationship with God. People have never been saved by works; it's
always been about faith just as in this verse.
READ Galatians 3:6-9
The provisions of God's
covenant with Abraham roll out over six chapters in Genesis (12-17). We know
these promises as the Abrahamic Covenant. Here's the sacrifice that seals
the covenant with Abraham. It's an animal sacrifice per God's specifications
and God passes between the pieces of sacrifice to mark his acceptance and
agreement. Apparently this was an ancient custom for sealing covenants
(contracts) between two parties. Not much is known about this custom, but
ancient extra-biblical sources indicate that the divided animals signified that
if you break the provisions of this covenant, what has happened to the animals
will happen to you. It is further worth noting that the term "make a
covenant" is really "cut a covenant" in the Hebrew language.
That seems to be a reference to the manner in which covenants were made - blood
sacrifice with the dividing of animals. Later on, covenants between parties
would not necessarily involve this kind of animal sacrifice, but the Hebrew
word for "cut," which is "kaw-rath´," continued to be used
to describe covenant transactions. Now notice the sealing of the covenant in
verse 17, "And it came to pass, that, when the sun went down, and it was dark,
behold a smoking furnace, and a burning lamp that passed between those
pieces." Make no mistake about it, this formal ceremony clearly marked
the establishment of the provisions of the covenant God made with Abraham.
There's a provision in
this covenant in verses 13-16 which must have been a little unsettling to
Abraham: His descendants would end up being servants for a period of time.
That's right; it's a reference to the Egyptian captivity which really began
when the family moved to Egypt in Genesis 46
God awards land to Abraham
and his descendants (Genesis 15:18-21)
God made another promise
to Abram on the day this covenant was made in verse 18, "In the same day
the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, Unto thy seed have I given this
land, from the river of Egypt unto the great river, the river Euphrates:"
That's from the Nile to the Euphrates. That passage has caused some
confusion because the tribes of Israel did not inhabit all of that land when
they arrived in the Book of Joshua. However, upon closer inspection, we see
that David did, in fact, control the territory all the way over to the
Euphrates. We see this in I Chronicles 18:3 (see notes) "And David smote Hadarezer king of Zobah
unto Hamath, as he went to stablish his dominion by the river Euphrates."
So, while the Israelites did not choose to live that far away, nonetheless
David's kingdom extended to that point, thus fulfilling the promise God made to
Abram in Genesis 15:18. There was a downside to God's provisions that day - Egyptian
captivity for 400 years in verses 13-14. Abraham knew about it before it
would even happen.
There's one more issue
that should be mentioned regarding Abraham's seed. There was, of course, the physical blessing of
prosperity for Israel as a significant part of this covenant's provisions.
There is an additional component which involves Believers. Look at Galatians 3:16 ), "Now to Abraham and his seed were
the promises made. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one,
And to thy seed, which is Christ." Paul makes the point that we are
all recipients of the promise God made to Abraham through Abraham's most
notable descendant, Jesus Christ our Lord. When God said in Genesis 12:3,
"...and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed," that's
talking about us - Christians! Specifically, the verse to which Paul was
certainly making reference regarding the "seed" issue is Genesis 22:18, "And in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be
blessed; because thou hast obeyed my voice." So, the physical
descendants of Abraham got land and physical prosperity out of the covenant,
but we all get Christ and eternal life out of it.
They've been in Canaan
now for 10 years and still no child. Sarai gets an idea; take Hagar my
Egyptian handmaid as your second wife; she'll give us a son. Abraham's
good with that idea, and Hagar conceives. That's where the trouble really
begins. Hagar gets a little snooty with Sarai (verse 4). Abraham grants Sarai
permission to deal with his second wife causing Hagar to fly the coop. After
being intercepted by "the angel of the LORD" on her way back to Egypt,
she willingly returns to Abram and Sarai for the birth of her child...with an
attitude adjustment I assume. It's interesting what the angel told her about
her not-yet-born son, Ishmael, in Genesis 16:12, "And he will be a
wild man; his hand will be against every man, and every man’s hand against him;
and he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren." As it turns out,
Ishmael had twelve sons (Genesis 17:20, see below) who dispersed all over the Arabian Peninsula. And just as the
angel said in verse 10, his descendants, the Arabs, are too plenteous to
number. Come to think of it, they're a scrappy bunch too...just as the
angel said (verse 12). Not just scrappy, but history reveals that, indeed, verse
12 is validated among Ishmael's Arab descendants even today.
We see in verse 13 that
this "angel of the LORD" is identified as "Jehovah/Yahweh"
himself. Whoa...here's an interesting comparison: Notice how similar
this incident is to Eve's encouragement to Adam in the garden with regard to
the fruit. Both ideas were conjured up by the women, offered to the men, and
both had bad outcomes. Incidentally, according to verse 16, Abraham is 86
years old when Ishmael is born, and Sarai is 76 or so.
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