This ability earns him the right to be called on by G-d. I do believe Abraham merited to be chosen, but I think the Torah tells us exactly what we are supposed to know and no more. The first thing we have to remember is that Abraham did not come from nowhere. At the end of chapter 11, in Genesis, we read:. Abraham was a good choice because he had a head start. He had already left his land and his birthplace.
He is in many ways continuing a journey that his father began. I think we all know this truth from our own lives. We all came from somewhere. We all are indebted to someone for something. In addition, G-d, chose Abraham because he was ready to hear and to serve. We know that his brother died. That his wife was barren. And that his family moved. Any of us who have experienced even one of these things know how challenging they can be.
And in you all the families of the earth will be blessed. Now Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran. Gen Despite his pagan background Josh , Abraham heard God's voice and obeyed leaving his extended family without any chance of an inheritance and the only country he's ever known to go somewhere new and unfamiliar.
The apostle Paul uses Abraham as an example to explain justification is by faith in God and not by ritual adherence to the Mosaic Law Rom In this instance Paul refers to God's promise to Abram of an heir Gen for no reason other than listening and obeying His word Gen Then behold, the word of the Lord came to him, saying, "This man will not be your heir; but one who will come forth from your own body, he shall be your heir.
Despite being married to a barren wife Gen , Abraham fully believes and trusts God to fulfill His promises, and after this discourse, God makes His unilateral and unconditional Abrahamic Covenant. From the biblical evidence, God does not present Himself as a physical being as He did with Adam Gen , nor as a supernatural force as He did with the nation of Israel Ex The pagan Abraham seemed to have heard the voice of God, determined that it was real, subjectively placed a trust in it and obeyed to go to some unknown location.
The uniqueness of Abraham's faith can be best appreciated when the Hebrew terms for faith is seen in their Old Testament context. Both terms imply an objective basis, such as a real fact s , that is deserving of this Hebrew faith. Thus faith is 1 a belief in something real and true and 2 a trusting confidence in that truth. When seen in the Old Testament, faith in God is often in the context of His work of deliverance through the Exodus.
After roughly years of silence see Years in Egypt? The miracles of the Exodus validate the historical reality of God and become the objective basis for faith for the nation of Israel. For God, faith was 1 the belief that He is real and true and 2 a trusting confidence in Him demonstrated by obeying His voice and keeping His covenant.
This determined whether the nation of Israel would be His own possession, a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. Now then, if you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant, then you shall be My own possession among all the peoples, for all the earth is Mine; and you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. As a reminder to the nation of Israel of the reality of God's existence, the Ten Commandments would open with "I am the Lord your God, who brought you out from the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery" Ex , and the Ten Commandments would be recited often.
The prophets of the Old Testament up until Daniel would recite this phrase or variants of it as a reminder of the historical reality of God Josh ; Judg ; 1 Sam ; 1 Ki ; 2 Ki ; Jer ; ; Dan When seen in the New Testament, faith in God is usually in the context of His work of deliverance through Jesus Christ. Although Jesus sought to demonstrate His deity through miracles throughout His earthly ministry, it was His death and resurrection that demonstrated the reality of Him being the Son of God as well as established the real existence of God the Father.
This historical event became the basis of the gospel. For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life. John But what does it say? Rom And so I love this idea and you think about, again, what is God looking for? Why is he choosing Abraham? And so this is really where I feel like is sort of ground zero for what it means to be a father. We learn in this passage, it is to train our children to understand the commands of the Lord, that they would understand justice and righteousness.
And I see as one of my greatest responsibilities as a father to be training the intuitions of my children in such a way that they get justice, they get righteousness. And this is a really challenging and important part of being a dad.
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