HAVE YOU EVER THOUGHT, “THERE MUST BE MORE TO LIFE THAN THIS?” SO DID ABRAM!

By Jill Roberts and Michael Canalé

 

As we were discussing this week’s study, Michael so very astutely said,

 

“Before we can show the amazing relevance of Abram in the life of every reader of our blog, we have to ask ourselves this most important question: ‘Who was Abram WHEN GOD CHOSE HIM?’ We know that he would become a player who moved chess pieces in the game of life, but WHY ABRAM in the first place?”

 

Had you ever considered this? I had not, but once Michael said these words, I knew that he had focused on the central issue of why we should take the time to closely examine the life of the man who would be Abraham and to do so long before he grew into his name.

 

As stated, to accomplish this, Michael says we should go to the very genesis of what we know about Abram. This, of course, takes us back to when he was living in Ur of the Chaldeans. This is WHERE he was when God called him. As Michael says, WHO was he then?

 

We know a number of pivotal facts about the Abram of that time.

 

First, he was probably in his 60’s. We don’t know for sure. Later, when he left his first detour, Harran,  Scripture records that he was seventy-five. ( Genesis 12:4) NIV.

 

 While still in the Chaldeans, Abram was at an age when people tend to begin to take stock of their lives. He, no doubt, had been reflecting on what his life had stood for, thus far. In this reflective mood and season, what would he have definitely noted? What would some of the particulars of his life have stirred in him?

 

First, we know that he had suffered the loss of his brother, Haran, (No connection to the city of Harran), the father of Lot, while he was still living in Ur of the Chaldeans. (Genesis 11:28) NIV. The loss of a sibling or any close family member tends to be a strong reminder of our own mortality. Not only would this death not have detracted from Abram’s age-related reflective mood, it would have further added to it. Abram was a man in a “looking deeply into life and its meaning” season. This is, so often, when God calls us.

 

As Abram looked back, what did he see? Materially, he was definitely living in a very prosperous region. The fact that he resided in an extremely civilized and wealthy area, is evidence that he was well off in worldly goods. However, this is implied but not express. There is some ambiguity here. Later, on the detour in Harran, Scripture notes that Abram had been accumulating possessions and people there in Harran. (Genesis 12:5) NIV. This is the FIRST Biblical reference to the actual wealth of Abram.

 

Certainly, this above fact is important. It is often written that Abram unquestionably “left it all” when he left the Chaldeans. This is a leap we are not prepared to make. Michael and I have made a promise to follow Scripture, wherever it leads, and Scripture leaves a good deal of uncertainty as to this issue.

 

One conclusion that we are able to draw, is that, based on his subsequent desire to greatly accumulate possessions and people in Harran, he was at the least a seeker of such prosperity while still in the Chaldeans. When he sized up his life, he must have thought that MORE of the material would make him a happier man.

 

How frequently God uses a seeker of more of  SOMETHING. He will let us accumulate greater and greater quantities until we see the emptiness of things. He allows us to come to the end of ourselves. He is patient, knowing so well that this will be the moment when, at last, we will look to the eternal, to Him.

 

Another assessment Abram would have made,  in reflecting on his life, would have been that, at the time of his residence in Ur, he and his wife, Sarai were childless. This may well have been troubling him. His own father was over seventy years old when Abram and his siblings were born. (Genesis 11:26) NIV. The Bible doesn’t tell us the age of their mother. She may have been quite young. It is probable that Sarai, on the other hand, might have reached an age, while they were still in Ur, when she would have had diminished or even nonexistent fertility.

 

That Abram wanted a child is a subject we will explore in depth in the weeks to come. Suffice it to say that, while still in Ur and before God’s call, Abram would have been under great personal and cultural pressure to have a son. Once again, this was a man reaching for MORE on many levels of his life.

 

The entire picture is one of a man without a child and without his fill of the material he wished to own, He viewed the fleeting of time as he was in his sixties and the sobering loss of family, a contemporary, dead and gone. Abram was searching for MORE things, children and time. In a word, Abram was literally POISED for a call from God.

 

For those of us who have ever pondered life and it’s meaning and wanted MORE than we see in our lives, nothing could be more relevant than the story of Abram.

 

Spiritually ripe in the eyes of God, Abram was ready, and the Almighty made His move. He came to the one who would have been satisfied with merely MORE and, offered him the WORLD. God said to Abram:

 

“Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you.

 

“I will make you into a great nation,

And I will bless you;

I will make your name great

And you will be a blessing.

I will bless those who bless you

And whoever curses you, I will curse;

AND ALL PEOPLE ON EARTH WILL BE BLESSED THROUGH YOU.”

(emphasis added)

Genesis 12:1-3) NIV

 

Set forth in an earlier blog, this promise from God bears repeating, now that we have looked at what was going on in the mind of the man to whom this call of God was given.

 

And now, God was speaking to him with a message meant for him alone. God had singled him out to be the most important person in the world…but he would need to leave what he knew, unrealized as much of it was, and embrace the unrealized in the extreme, all based on the promise of God for unparalleled greatness. What would he do?

 

What also is unparalleled in this world, is the suspense and drama of Scripture!

 

A million thoughts must have been going through Abram’s mind. God has not told us everything Abram weighed. We believe that He wants us to do exactly what we are doing today – to ponder all this and to put ourselves in the shoes of the man, Abram, who’s received a great call and now must MAKE a great call on which everything rides. And that he did:

 

“So, Abram went, as the LORD had told him; and Lot with him. Abram was seventy-five years old WHEN HE SET OUT FROM HARRAN  He took his wife Sarai, his nephew Lot, all the possessions they had accumulated in Harran, AND THEY SET OUT FOR THE LAND OF CANAAN, AND THEY ARRIVED THERE.

(emphasis added)

Genesis 12:4-5) NIV

 

As discussed in an earlier blog, there was this detour… Next week, we will see how Abram’s state of mind there influenced him greatly in the years to come. But, in a key conclusion…

 

As Michael asked,

 

“Really, who was Abram?”

 

How critical that question is. And, now, having probed its nuances and depths, Michael asks another central question, one that he answers so well:

 

“Who is this God Who gives us a Bible that records failure after failure, detour after detour from God’s instructions? God has given us this Scripture, chapters of stepping stones to teach us His ways. How wisely He has seen that there is NO learning curve without the story of disobedience.”

 

Who, then, is the Abram of Ur? He is a seeker wanting MORE out of life.

 

Who, then, is God during the era of Abram in Ur? He is a strategic genius, taking this seeker,  ready for MORE, and giving it to him historically, iconically, convincingly!

 

Ask yourself this: Did Abram say, “ Call me into Your service. I want more of You.” NOT AT ALL. He just said MORE. Was Abram not saying, “There must be more to life than this.” Have we all had such a sentence in our thoughts, even if not actually spoken? When we say this, when we ask for MORE of anything, God says, “Finally! You want More. My child, I can work with this.”

 

Would Abram, the seeker, have a straight,  unblemished path to patriarchal glory? Hardly! But, as Michael says, from Abram’s detours, will come our learning.

 

Join us next week. We hope that this week we, through the power of God, delivered relevance to your life. We promise, by God’s grace, to do the same next week. Until then, every blessing.