“Why God Speaks to Us: To Comfort” - Pastor Hines March 13, 2022

“Why God Speaks to Us: To Comfort” - Pastor Hines

March 13, 2022

 Abram is the main character in our text this morning.  We know him as Abraham. At the age of 99 God changed his name from “Abram” which means “God is exalted” to “Abraham” meaning “Father of many nations.” God changed his name to reflect God’s great plan for Abraham’s life. Verse 1 begins - After these things – what things? Abram had just left the battlefield. He won the battle, but it’s true what they say: WAR is HELL.

After the battle was over, Abram had a vision. He had an enlightening experience. He perceived an important spiritual revelation from God almighty. Friends, it does not get better than that. A word from God is a good thing. Abram heard a word from the God who had just helped him win the battle, the God who is determined to comfort, console, and encourage all God’s children. Hopefully, we all know such a God. This God of comfort, consolation, and encouragement spoke to Abraham who had just fought off his enemies. Of course, Abram knew even after you win a battle you still have to watch your back. The words God spoke  are marvelous: “Do not be afraid, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great.”  When God tells us to not be afraid, that a shield will be provided, and we will be rewarded, that would be a hint to most of us that another battle is forthcoming.

 

It seems like Abram might have been complaining a bit when he says to God, “O Lord God, what will you give me, for I continue childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus? ‘You have given me no offspring, and so a slave born in my house is to be my heir.’”

One would think that God responded to Abram very gently, and not as a mere complainer. Verse 4 says, But the word of the Lord came to Abram, ‘This man shall not be your heir; no one but your very own issue (your own flesh and blood) shall be your heir.’ ⁵He brought him outside and said, ‘Look towards heaven and count the stars, if you are able to count them.’ (which, of course, he couldn’t) Then God said to Abram, ‘So shall your descendants be.’ Abram would have a wonderful legacy that would be known far and wide.

Last week we talked about the human need for positive attention. God promising to make Abram a father of many nations is a big deal. It’s positive attention. In God’s plan, one way or another, everybody is somebody. God can make good things happen as we walk with God who loves us. We are a big deal to God and that helps us to be a big deal to one another!

Verse 6 says Abram believed God would make his name great; the Lord reckoned it to him, that is, the Lord credited him for believing God’s promise is good. To believe God is to do something, to believe God is to act like you understand that God means business. To believe is to be good as gold, to be valuable to God’s kingdom, to believe is right living, or righteousness.

Verse 7 tells us what God does when we decide to believe. 7 Then God said to Abram, ‘I am the Lord who brought you from Ur of the Chaldeans, to give you this land to possess.’ God reminds us how we have been delivered and what blessings lie ahead for us. Have you ever been delivered and enjoyed the fulfillment of God’s promises?

Abram put a “but” in the conversation in verse 8. ⁸But Abram said, ‘O Lord God, how am I to know that I shall possess it (the land)?’ ⁹God showed him the sacrifices that were required. They were listed from large to small. “Bring me a heifer three years old, a female goat three years old, a ram three years old, a turtle-dove, and a young pigeon.” Abram did what he was asked to do. Every social gathering and group, including the church, calls for an offering, a sacrifice, a giving of something to show you value and appreciate being a part of something important.  Sacrifices were used to affirm a covenant with God.

¹⁰Abram brought the five animals to God as requested. They were all ceremonially clean and acceptable sacrifices according to the law. *The law required these sacrificial animals to be one year old. But, in this case, God requested three year old animals. Scholars have a heyday with that distinction. Some speculate that three years symbolizes the three years of Jesus before he was sacrificed or the three generations of what is called the Blood Covenant as it would be for Abraham, Issac and Jacob, but not Reuben.

A covenant being legally binding, was cut like a contract or cut like a deal. In fact, the directions were to cut the sacrifices in half, representing the two parties - one piece on one side and the other piece beside it. One piece represented God, the other humans. Fire and smoke passed between the two in verse 17, representing God’s holy presence. We all know there are contracts and covenants that are not holy, don’t we. This covenant was designed to last three generations before it had to be reviewed, renewed, revisited, and reworked.

Lent is OUR season to review, renew, revisit and rework our side of our covenant with the Almighty! What a comfort it is to serve a God who is willing to be in covenant partnership with us, to never leave us or forsake us. God encourages us to grow, attempts to nurture us, accepts us as we are, yet loves us too much to leave us that way!

As the sun went down that day, according to verse 12, a dark cloud descended on Abraham. Life, even the Christian life, has plenty of sunshine and plenty of dark clouds. What was comforting for Abraham was that despite the warfare in his life, he fell into a deep, and what I like to assume was a peaceful sleep.  Psalm 4 says God blesses us with sleep and a sense of safety. If we have a restless night or tend to have insomnia, we may have to go deep in meditation and prayer to get to the blessing of peace-filled sleep that Abraham had. That day, God promised him land from the Nile to the Euphrates, a thousand miles away.

17 When the sun had gone down and it was dark. The darkness was terrifying. Instead of wine and caviar, the cutting of this contract was marked with the smoking fire-pot and flaming torch passing between the pieces of the sacrifice. This was a comforting cultural reminder of God’s holy presence, especially in a time of darkness and distress. It could also have been the creative darkness of the woman and the deep darkness of the ocean or as Howard Thurman puts it “the luminous darkness. That day, according to verse 18, that the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying, ‘To your descendants I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, Euphrates River.

The God of all comfort spoke to Abram with blessings that were bigger than life and bigger than death. The God of all comfort is ready to bless you as well. Are you ready to receive God’s blessings of comfort and care? Are you ready to share such blessings? Open your heart. Let it be so today! Amen.

 

*https://hermeneutics.stackexchange.com/questions/30823/why-was-abraham-required-to-bring-three-year-old-offerings-sacrifices-in-genesis#