When God Calls

When God Calls

Genesis 12:1-9

Main Idea: God calls us to obey Him in faith.

     Deana did not realize she was marrying a pastor. When we married on March 4, 2000, I was working at Hartness International in Greenville, SC. While we were very active and involved in our church, I knew God was asking me to go in a entirely different direction than either myself or Deana had planned. Within five years of being married, we packed up and moved to Seneca, SC where I became a pastor. Within two months after that, I enrolled in the Masters program at North Greenville University. Over the last ten years, we have been on a spiritual journey, aligning our lives with God's calling.

     The spiritual journey God calls us to take often lack the precise markers of a vacation trip from one place to another. Consider the starting point of any spiritual journey. Do any of us fully understand precisely where we are in terms of our spiritual health? We might have a vague idea. I discovered I needed to mature spiritually before God would press me into service. What about the destination? I am convinced we cannot know everywhere God will lead us in this life or in His ministry. What about the schedule? God does things in His time, not ours. What about the accommodations? God will supply our every need “according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus” (Phil. 4:19), but He might not supply us in ways we anticipate.

     What about the route of this spiritual journey? I never imagined when I entered ministry that I would have taken numerous mission trips to foreign countries, earned my doctorate, or be writing a book. God keeps on surprising us with new ministries and opportunities. The one constant Deana and I have found throughout our spiritual journey is the Lord's presence with us, guiding, sustaining, and encouraging us.

Understanding the Context

     In Genesis 12:1-9, we read about God's call to Abram to begin two journeys. One was a physical journey, taking Abram to a distant, undisclosed destination; the second was a spiritual journey, resulting in his becoming the father of the faith community, God's people. Abram did not know the destination, time frame, route, or accommodations. He did know, however, that the Lord would show him the land.

     Abram's call is best understood in the context of Genesis 1-11. In those chapters, four key themes emerged and were emphasized through accounts of God dealing with people. The first theme revealed was God as Creator, culminating in His creation of people. Creation is the overarching theme, pointing us to the centrality of God's relationship with people and vice versa.

     Three additional themes were woven throughout the various accounts of Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, Noah and his generation, and the people of Babel/Babylon. The second theme was sin's entrance into and prevalence in humanity. The third theme was God's displeasure and judgment of human sin. The fourth theme was God's redeeming grace toward sinful humanity. We see these three themes in the accounts of Adam and Eve (Gen. 3), Cain and Abel (Gen. 4), and Noah's generation (Gen. 6-9).

     However, the fourth account, that of the people of Babel/Babylon and their city and tower (Gen. 11:1-9), seems to break the three-theme cycle of sin, judgment, and grace. The people of Babel/Babylon sinned by ignoring God. He judged them by confusing their language, destroying their tower, and scattering them over the face of the earth. Yet when we look for the theme of God's redeeming grace, we find instead a genealogy (Gen. 11:10-32). We are left asking, “How will God bring His redeeming grace to lost, scattered humanity?” The answer is in the genealogy. God would bring His redeeming grace to lost, scattered humanity through Abram and his descendants.

Exploring the Text

Genesis 12:1:

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”

     Genesis 12:1-3 is one of the great call passages in the Bible. These verses tell us about God's call for Abram to let go of everything that provided security and comfort to him. God called Abram to obey Him in faith and to follow a different course for his life than anything he had known or done previously.

     Abram's call initiated with God: the Lord said to Abram. In many translations, the name LORD appears in all capital letters to signify the use of the covenant name for God in the Hebrew text. The presence of this name provides a covenant imprint on the entire passage. Yahweh communicated to Abram about the covenant He was establishing to bring His redeeming grace to lost, sinful, humanity.

     God told Abram to “go from” three key things in his life. First, the Lord told Abram to go out from his land. We learned in Genesis 11:27-31 that Abram was originally from Ur, a city located in a region that today is in southern Iraq. Subsequently, Abram journeyed with his family to Haran, located in an area that today is in southeastern Turkey. However, the phrase “your country” implies more than just a location on a map. These were places where Abram had “put down his roots.” To obey the command to go out from “your country/land” meant leaving his familiar surroundings, his community.

     Second, the Lord told Abram to “go from your kindred/relatives.” The term relatives (“kindred,” KJV, ESV; “people,” NIV) renders a Hebrew word derived from the verb meaning “to bear.” Specifically, it refers to all people related to Abram by blood ties-that is, born into his family or clan. One's extended family of relatives, or tribe, were a chief source of security and support. When God commanded Abram to go out from his relatives, He was teaching Abram that he could not obey God fully while clinging to the security of his extended family. Other Bible students have viewed the land as a source of security and relatives as a source of community. In either view, the emphasis is that all people have these basic needs: security, identity, and community.

     Third, Abram was told to go out from “his father's house.” Abram's father, Terah, had died in Haran. Abram had received his name and identity from his father's house. In fact, Abram means “exalted father,” at first a tribute to Terah and then later to Abram as well. Obeying the command to go out from his father's house meant leaving his name behind-in other words, going to a place where his name was unknown.

     God's call and command went from general to specific: go out from the land, the clan, and the man. These refer to three crucial aspects of life: community, security, and identity. When we compare the three things the Lord asked Abram to go out from, we discover the Lord was asking Abram to let go of the very things the citizens of Babel/Babylon had tried to grasp for themselves.

     This is a challenging call to radical obedience. The Lord asked Abram to live by faith and obey His word. There would be great change and upheaval, but it was a call for Abram to trust the Lord enough to obey Him.

Applying the Scripture:

What are some examples of difficult things God may call us to do today? How do those things compare with the directive given to Abram?