I will bless those who bless you and curse those who curse you. God's seven blessing to Abraham God's masterplan for a utopian society - righteousness, justice, and the way of God "Possessing" the land for the burial of Sarah Isaac and Ishmael - a story yet incomplete The moral and religious conflict between Judaism and Islam THE BINDING OF ISAAC-THE NON-EVENT THAT CHANGED THE WORLD The Bible points out the similarities between the fertility of the plain of the Jordan and that of the land of Egypt. Abraham and Lot had just returned from Egypt. By choosing the richness of the Jordan plain, Lot was demonstrating his preference for the lifestyle of Egypt and his rejection of the way of life of Abraham. Remember Gen.11:1-9. Abraham believed God and it was accounted to him for righteousness. | God has always love to deal with Man in covenants.A covenant is an agreement between two people sealed by an oath of blood.Gods blessings are free but are conditional.If the blessings are unconditional,then it is called a promise.This means you have a part to play to commit His integrity to play His.Abraham had obeyed God to sacrifice his only Son and leave his country and family to strange land before the blessings were released ;In response,God then made him a blessing to all generations.God takes Obedience pretty seriously. During the second covenant that God establishes with Abraham involving circumcision, God introduces Himself with the words: (Genesis 17:1) The Bible is telling us here that Abraham embodies the attributes of God and he is to walk before God as His representative to the world. From this point on, trust in God will become a foundational aspect of the lives of the Biblical forefathers, and will in turn become the model for the Jewish peoples relationship with God. You have to be born into to it by receiving Jesus. A. For the sake of God, Abraham was prepared to sabotage his inheritance. God will now bless these descendants. They will be fruitful, successful against their enemies, and a source of admiration and emulation from the nations of the world. This will be discussed again in more detail on the chapter about the Binding of Isaac. Lead us in our calling.We do this by letting the Holy Spirit Proverbs 3:5 Trust in the LORD with all might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly. There are hints in the text that this dispute between uncle and nephew was not only about economic resources but also a philosophical one. 0000021858 00000 n Finally he dies and his bones are taken to be buried in Canaan. In this sermon outline we list only seven of the blessings given to or through Abraham. 0000019183 00000 n Christ redeemed us from more than just sin and the law; He redeemed us from poverty and sickness, because those things are supposedly included in the blessing of Abraham. A firstborn son received a double-blessing. The First Blessing God promises is that He will "open for you the windows of heaven". . Genesis 12:2 and make thy name great. On the horns of the golden altar (Exodus 30:10). So the greatest thing we can do as believers is to live to please Him on a daily basis. A. 0000001290 00000 n The seven-fold sprinkling implies that it was perfectly and spiritually efficacious. These sources are of interest not necessarily because of their accuracy, but because they all indicate that they were prepared to consider other locations for Ur other than southern Mesopotamia. On the other hand, these commentaries were all written when Ur was no longer inhabited and it is possible that they were unaware of this citys existence. However, there are other good reasons to consider a southern Mesopotamian Ur of the Chaldees as being unlikely. Southern Mesopotamia is the habitation of the descendants of Ham, whereas the descendants of Shem lived in present day Turkey, Iran, and Northern Iraq. According to Genesis 10:22-31, the five sons of Shem were Elam, Asshur, Arphaxad, Lud and Aram. Abraham was one of the descendants of Arphaxad (Genesis 11:12-25) Josephus suggests that these five sons gave rise to the nations of Elam, Assyria, Chaldea, Lydia and Levantine. An Ur of the Chaldeans in southern Mesopotamia also leads to a very obvious contradiction in the Biblical text. While in Haran, Abraham is told to leave your birthplace (moladtecho). Also, when requesting his servant Eliezer to take a wife for his son Isaac, he tells him to go to Haran to my land and my birthplace (moladeti) shall you go and take a wife for my son, for Isaac (Genesis 24:4). But earlier his birthplace (moladato) is referred to as Ur of the Chaldeans.43 Also, in the Covenant between the Pieces, God takes responsibility for taking Abraham from Ur Kasdim: And he said: I am YKVK Who brought you out of Ur Kasdim to give you this land to inherit. (Genesis 15:7). book I was reminded of the Holy Spirit that Jesus has signed the Book of Life of more help or if you want more information please visit: . Maimonides, the influential Jewish thinker and legal authority, wrote in his monumental legal work the Mishna Torah: But was Abrahams discovery of monotheism such a unique accomplishment that it merited God appearing to him in visions and offering to create from his seed a new nation? Join us on Thursday, as 7 pastors will determine the same blessing of Abraham described in Genesis 12:2-3, in your life today. )is a keyword in this passage, being repeated ten times. Accordingly, it defines the theme of this paragraph which is about a covenant between Elokim and Abraham. The number 10 may signify the ten generations between Noah and Abraham, since Noah also participated in a covenant with Elokim. #6 - I will uphold My covenant between Me and you and your offspring after you, throughout their generations, as an everlasting covenant to be a God to you and to your offspring after you. 4:13,14. It is better for God to make our name great than for us to seek it out ourselves. 9.First Paragraph. But these are the very beliefs credited to Abraham! Galatians 3:29 says, "If ye be Christ's then are you Abraham's seed and heirs according to the promise." That means you are blessed spiritually, physically, and financially. 23. I AM A SON AND HEIR OF GOD THROUGH CHRIST. #1 Great Nation. Lead us to our spouse.B. in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed.May we as children of God receive all God have for us through our Great God and Elokim is forging a special relationship with Abraham and his descendants by promising to be a God to them.41 At first glance these two sentences seem similar to each other, but they do in fact express very different ideas. In the last but one sentence, Elokim promises to be a God to Abraham and his seed forever and this would include periods of exile. In the last sentence, He also promises to be their eternal God but in the land of Canaan.42 In essence, He asserts that He will be their God throughout the entirety of Jewish history. True faith is based on the word of God. In life, we are not saved by making promises to God but by believing Gods promises to us. He promised to curse those who curse Abraham. (Tenth paragraph, the history of Terah in ACommentary on the Book of Genesis , Part Two, from Noah to Abraham, p273) Both places are the land of his kindred and the contradiction disappears. However, the contradiction also disappears if one assumes that Haran and Ur of the Chaldeans were both in the same geographical area - in Aram. could also be the nations that Abraham will father. He has already fathered Ishmael. The reader will learn shortly that he is to father Isaac. When Sarah dies, Abraham will father children from a second wife Katurah. These and the offspring of Ishmael will leave Canaan to go southwards into the Arabian Peninsula. The offspring of Isaac will remain in Canaan, but a branch of this family will go eastwards to form the nation of Edom. Before we explore these powerful provisions, it is important for you to understand what a covenant is and the terms upon which your inheritance is based. "Growing in God's Grace" Adult Sunday School Today at 11:00 am. Genesis 12:2 And I will make of thee a great nation, A. , This difference in territorial borders is a reflection of the ideas that the names for God Elokim and YKVK are promoting. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); And I beheld, and I heard the voice of many angels round about the throne and the beasts and the elders: and the number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands; Create a free website or blog at WordPress.com. Abrahams role in this covenant is revealed at the very beginning of this passage: walk before Me and be wholehearted (Genesis 17:1), God is saying - you, Abraham, are to walk in front of me and be my representative to the world. This should be contrasted with Noah, who walked with God.39 What Abraham represents is not delineated in this passage, but is mentioned in the very next section. In brief, Abraham will teach notions of justice and righteousness (Genesis 13:19) to his children and they by their example will instruct the rest of the world. God is the epitome of justice and righteousness and He needs a representative on earth who will embody His attributes and by example bring these ideas to the rest of humanity., A number of interpretations of the phrase wholehearted(tamim) have been proposed. Nachmanides relates it to a similar use of this word in Deuteronomy when the Bible discusses forbidden magical practices and which concludes there with the phrase you shall be wholehearted with YKVK your God (Deuteronomy 18:13). Just as you are to avoid magical practices and retain your trust in Me, so also are you to walk before Me and maintain your belief in Me.40 Interestingly, this passage is introduced by YKVK. Have the attitude of the Psalmist. God also provided no opening for Abraham to negotiate about the justice of His decree as He would later do for Sodom.. hb```f``e`e`Wbf@ a(I Joseph Parker wrote Great lives are trained by great promises. Abrahams first stop on arriving in Canaan is the city of Shechem, and he sets up an altar there in response to the vision he has received. III. From Shechem, Abraham relocates to the mountain east of Bethel and pitches his tent with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east. , 30.This is just one of several interpretations of this phrase but it seems to be the most literal with respect to the text. Midrashic explanations, and this is the direction followed by Rashi, suggest that he was worried that he had already received reward for his righteousness. This means that he could expect no further Divine assistance and would be punished for the lives he had taken or would receive no further assistance from God if there were a reprisal attack. Nachmanides suggests he might die without children. Luzzatto) translated by Daniel A. Klein, p157. James Aranson Inc. to Genesis 17.9. thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto a land that , Gods solution is to repopulate the world with the offspring of Noah, and His hopes are focused in particular on the descendants of Noahs son Shem. Now, after ten generations, there is a descendent of Shem, Abraham, with whom He can partner to bring the ideas of ethical monotheism to the world., A thematic linkage between this passage and the covenant with Noah is established in a number of ways, in addition to both being established by Elokim. Similar to the covenant with Abraham, the word, is a key word in the covenant with Noah and appears there seven times. God bless. Bereishis, OU Press). Prior to being given the fourth blessing, Abraham finds himself involved in local politics and conflict and successfully attacks invading forces from Mesopotamia to rescue his nephew Lot. This is not an irrelevant side-story to the biblical narrative. Without intention, Abraham suddenly finds himself a regional power with an empire extending from close to Egypt up to Mesopotamia. At this point, he does not have the resources to keep this empire together and almost certainly no desire either but he is pointing out to later generations that it is part of YKVKs design that Israel become a regional power between the empires of Mesopotamia and Egypt..

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