Thru the Bible-2

 

Thru the Bible-2 2022. 1. 23.

 

God’s Calling

 

◎ Genesis 12:1~2

1 Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you.

2 And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing.”

 

◎ Explanatory Notes

☞ The call of Abram consists of a command and a promise. The command is to leave the place of all his old and fond associations, for a land which he had not yet seen, and therefore did not know. Three ties are to be severed in complying with this command - his country, in the widest range of his affections; his place of birth and kindred comes closer to his heart; his father’s house is the inmost circle of all his tender emotions. (Albert Barnes)

☞ Note four particulars in this divine call. 1) Abram was to leave his native country, the fertile land where his fathers had dwelt for centuries, with its cities and its civilization, the mountains and noble rivers of his childhood. 2) His kindred, the stock of Eber, whom he left in Chaldea. 3) His father’s house, the family of Terah, whom he left in Haran. The closest earthly ties were to be broken. 4) He was to go forth, he knew not whither, unto a land that God should show him. He was to exchange the town and the pastoral life for that of the nomad; to leave the massive temples of Chaldea to build altars here and there in the wilderness. But by faith he saw his father-land, his home, in the promise of God. (Daniel Whedon)

☞ Be thou a blessing. “It is more blessed to give than to receive” and, like the great Antitype, Abram’s highest glory was in being a fount of blessing to all mankind. (Daniel Whedon)

 

◎ Summary

We have here the call by which Abram was removed out of the land of his nativity into the land of promise, which was designed both to try his faith and obedience, and also to set him apart for God. (Wesley)

Likewise we have to walk a life of listening to and responding to God’s calling.