The Messiah and the Covenants of Israel (Continued)



"He believed in the Lord"

The Abrahamic Covenant (Continued)

The importance of faith

This element of faith is of vital importance. In a further encounter with God, Abram expressed a prayer for a son. “Lord God, what will You give me, seeing I go childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?” (Gen. 15:2) God replied, “This one shall not be your heir, but one who will come from your own body shall be your heir.” Then He brought him outside and said, “Look now toward heaven, and count the stars if you are able to number them.” And He said to him, “So shall your descendants be.” (Gen. 15:5) “And he believed in the Lord, and He accounted it to him for righteousness”. (Gen. 15:6) This very episode became a corner stone of the doctrinal writings of Paul, that great expositor of Christology. He referred to it in Romans. “Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness” (Rom. 4:3; see also v. 9 and v.22) and again in his Galatian letter (Gal.3:6).  James also quoted it. (Jas.2:23) It is almost impossible to exaggerate the magnitude of this episode in the patriarch’s life. God made him a promise and he believed. The encounter began with an expression of doubt vocalized by Abram, to which God responded with a renewed promise of staggering proportions, and concluded with Abram fully embracing it. While the fulfillment of the initial covenant depended only on the faithfulness of the Lord, this event, surely known beforehand to God, demonstrated Abram’s wholehearted engagement in the purposes of the Lord. Abram’s response to the promise, identified faith as the catalyst to activate the blessing that was to come to the Jewish nation, and indeed the blessing that would fall to all who had similar faith to Abram. Those that trust in the promise of God, and in the God of the promise, will be blessed. “Therefore it is of faith that it might be according to grace, so that the promise might be sure to all the seed, not only to those who are of the law, but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all.” (Rom. 4:16)  That Paul wrote after the death of the Messiah, and identified the inclusion of the Gentiles, demonstrates the quality and scope of the covenant with Abram.

The observation of Moses,  that Abram believed in the Lord, and He accounted it to him for righteousness; inserted as it is in the historical narrative, must lead to the question, how did Abram demonstrate his faith to make Moses remark on it? And how did the Lord demonstrate He had accepted it and valued it so highly? The answer is found in that which immediately follows. The promise to Abram by the Lord was ratified in such a way to establish it beyond contradiction. It came in the wake of a plea from Abram for such an assurance. When the Lord repeated that Abram would be given future title to the land of Canaan, (Gen.15:7) Abram asked, “Lord God, how shall I know that I will inherit it?” (Gen. 15:8) The Lord’s response was to initiate a ceremony that would give the promise covenant status. This event needs to be laid out in order to get the full impact.

 1.            God assured Abram that the land would be his; “I am the Lord, who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldeans, to give you this land to inherit it.” (Gen. 15:7)

2.            Abram asked for some kind of sign to confirm this promise, saying “Lord God, how shall I know that I will inherit it?” (Gen. 15:8)

3.            God commanded Abram to bring an heifer, a goat, a ram and two birds.

4.            Abram laid them out in the fashion of a ceremony designed for the ratification of an agreement between two parties. “Then he brought all these to Him and cut them in two, down the middle, and placed each piece opposite the other; but he did not cut the birds in two.” (Gen. 15:10)

5.            These portions of the sacrifice had to be protected by Abram. “And when the vultures came down on the carcasses, Abram drove them away”. (Gen. 15:11)

6.            After the sun went down, God placed Abram in a deep sleep during which he had a nightmarish dream. “Now when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram; and behold, horror and great darkness fell upon him.” (Gen. 15:12)

7.            Then God spoke to Abram and told him the time for possessing the land was not yet, so they would not occupy the land for more than half a millennia. “Know certainly that your descendants will be strangers in a land that is not theirs, and will serve them, and they will afflict them four hundred years. And also the nation whom they serve I will judge; afterward they shall come out with great possessions”. (Gen. 15:13,14) (Maimonides (Moses Ben Maimon), the celebrated Jewish commentator from the 12^thcentury, suggests the oppression of Israel in Egypt was the result of Abram’s inadvertent sin in going down to Egypt at the time of famine in Canaan. (See his comment on Gen.12.10 referred to in the Jewish Study Bible))

8.            God indicated that Abram would have long life. “Now as for you, you shall go to your fathers in peace; you shall be buried at a good old age”. (Gen. 15:15)

9.            God added the reason for the delay in their taking possession of the land. “But in the fourth generation they shall return here, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete.” (Gen. 15:16) This meant that the Amorites, one of the occupying tribes of Canaan were not yet ripe for punishment - punishment here being the loss of Canaan.

10.        In the darkness of an eastern night after the sun had set, Abram’s deep sleep continued, in which God unilaterally established the covenant between the two of them. “And it came to pass, when the sun went down and it was dark, that behold, there appeared a smoking oven and a burning torch that passed between those pieces. On the same day the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying: ‘To your descendants I have given this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the River Euphrates— the Kenites, the Kenezzites, the Kadmonites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Rephaim, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites, and the Jebusites.’” (Gen. 15:17-21)

 The fire of the theophany, for such it was, symbolized judgment on the enemies of the seed of Abram, who were the subject of the prophecy that introduced the event. From the furnace there emanated shafts of fire. While the contract was made between the two parties, it is clear that the Lord was the only guarantor of the contract, a covenant of grant. He alone passed between the separated animal carcasses. Abram was present solely as the beneficiary.

 But how was the promised blessing of God to be realized?  Sarai was barren – she had not, nor could have, children. The answer seemed obvious - Abram must take another wife. Sarai’s maid, Hagar, brought up from Egypt, was chosen. But God’s ways are higher than man’s ways, even Abram’s. As Abram could not be blessed while resident in Babylonia, so also an Egyptian slave girl cannot be the mother of the nation elected by God to be the cradle that would hold the Messiah. Ishmael was born and Ishmael would be the father of a great nation, but it would not be the elect people. (Gal.4:21-31)

More Next Time

---