The Second Sunday in Lent
Shepherd
of the Hills Ev. Lutheran Church (WELS)
Put Me First
Genesis 12:1-8
The Lord had said to Abram, “Go from your country, your people and your father’s
household to the land I will show you. 2 “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. 3 I will bless those who bless
you, and whoever curses you I will curse;
and
all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.”
4 So Abram went, as the Lord had told
him; and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he set out
from Harran. 5 He took his wife Sarai, his
nephew Lot, all the possessions they had accumulated and the people they had acquired in Harran, and they set out for the
land of Canaan, and they arrived there. 6 Abram
traveled through the land as far as the site of the great tree of Moreh at
Shechem. At that time the Canaanites were in the land. 7 The
Lord appeared to Abram and said, “To your offspring I will give this land.” So
he built an altar there to the Lord, who had appeared to him. 8 From
there he went on toward the hills east of Bethel and pitched his tent, with Bethel on the west and
Ai on the east. There he built an altar to the Lord and called on the name of
the Lord. (NIV)
“You never get a second
chance to make a first impression.” This
statement clearly expresses the importance of making a good first impression,
and rightly so, as first impressions can make all the difference. It’s said that the impression an employer
gets in the first several minutes from an interviewer may have more to do with
the potential for hire than even the résumé or the rest of the interview
itself. The initial impressions two
people have of each other on a date is going to go a long way in determining how
long that date will last and if any more dates will follow. The realtor showing a house knows that in
order to woo potential buyers, curb appeal and the impression that comes with
the first step through the front door can make all the difference in receiving offers. First impressions matter.
So what is your first
impression of Abram as we are introduced to him for the first time in the pages
of Scripture here in Genesis 12? What do
we think of this 75 year-old man whom God called out to pull up his tent stakes
and start marching? Oh, and mind you,
God hadn’t initially revealed to Abram exactly where he’d be going; just that
he’d be going “to the land I will show you” (v.1). Based on the significance of the promise
(promises, really) God gave to Abram, I suppose we could conclude that
Abram must have been quite special, and that God himself must have had a pretty
high opinion of him. After all, look at
the extent of God’s promise to Abram: “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 peoples on earth will be
blessed through you” (v.2-3). That’s
quite a promise God gave to Abram.
Regardless of our impression of Abram, it would seem that he must have
left quite an impression on God.
And one might just draw that
conclusion… if not paying any attention to the order of things. We notice, after all, that God gave the
promise before Abram had even had the
chance to respond to his call, not after.
God’s promise was not predicated on
whether or not Abram would go as he had been told. God did not covenant a conditional with
Abram. It was not, “If you…, then I.” Rather, God called out his command, but then
immediately attached a promise to it. The
promise was the prompt for Abram’s actions, not a response to them. Another way to look at it is that God did not
call Abram because he was worthy, but it was rather God’s call that made him
worthy in the first place. God chose to
bless Abram with such promises, not because of who Abram was, but because of
who God is.
We also take note of how the
whole interaction between God and Abram got started, for recognizing that makes
all the difference in understanding how relationships between God and men work. We see that God came to Abram and called him,
not the other way around. That is always
the way it works, for it is an impossibility for frail and fallen man to
initiate a relationship with the high and holy God. No, God must call out to man.
Now let’s review just what
God called out to this man, Abram. “Go
from your country,” (v.1) he said.
While this may be the broadest aspect of God’s call to Abram, that
doesn’t mean it was any easier to give up.
Abram was being asked to leave the only land that was familiar to
him. Geographically speaking, he knew
the lay of the land; it was his home turf.
He had become accustomed to where things were and how long it took to
get everywhere. We might say he knew
which post office was closest, where the cheapest gas was, which grocery stores
had the best prices, and where all his favorite local hangouts were. In calling him to up and relocate, God was
asking him to give up all the comfort and security that comes with being in a
familiar place.
In addition to being called
to “Go
from your country,” God called Abram also to leave “your people” (v.1). It’s hard enough to leave a place you know,
let alone people you know – people who aren’t strangers, but neighbors. Even if there’s no deep connection with the
mailman, he’s a familiar face. The same
car pulling out at the same time in the morning during the same commute to work
provides a sense of habit and routine.
The neighbors walking their dogs, riding their bikes, and jogging by
with regularity all make up the community.
And Abram was being called to give all of it up.
Perhaps most trying of all, God
asked Abram to leave “your father’s household” (v.1). Abram was being asked to leave behind
his family. As familiar as home may be,
one can eventually get used to a new area so that it will, after time, cease
being new and unfamiliar and will become home.
And those people that Abraham knew in his home community, his neighbors
and acquaintances, eventually new people and new faces will start to become
familiar enough that they feel like home.
Family, though, cannot be replaced.
Parents are parents. Siblings are
siblings. Family is family, and Abram
was being asked to leave behind a significant portion of his family, and there
was no guarantee that he’d ever see them again.
So what was God really asking
of Abram when he called him to leave country, people, and family behind? He was asking for first place in his
life. Not only was God calling him to be
willing to part with all that was near and dear to him, but he was also calling
Abram to put him first in trusting that he would provide for him moving
forward. Even if Abram would have had Google
at his fingertips to research the job market, the housing market, the
neighborhoods, etc., it wouldn’t have mattered, because Abram had no clue which
address to plug in. He didn’t know where
he was going. He was being called to
fully rely on God to provide all of the unknowns for him. He was being called to put God first.
And isn’t that really what
God wants of us? As we consider what it
means to grow in our faith, can’t we think of that as growing in our willingness
and ability to distance ourselves from anything that would encroach on God’s
rightful place of prominence in our lives?
Isn’t putting him first being willing to forsake all for his sake? While God hasn’t necessarily called us to leave
country, land, and family to move to an undisclosed location, he has called us
to be ready and willing to leave anything and everything behind that could
potentially compromise our faith or hijack his number one spot in our lives.
He has called us to follow in
Abram’s footsteps. Notice Abram’s
remarkable response to God’s calling: he went.
“So Abram went, as the Lord had
told him; and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he set
out from Harran”
(v.4). Abram
wasn’t a spring chicken, and yet, we have no recorded excuse from him
whatsoever; just, “So Abram went…” Do you
remember another calling from God at a burning bush? Moses’ response was quite different, having
compiled a nice long list of excuse after excuse after excuse – anything to get
out of what God was calling him to do.
We see none of that from Abram, but rather 100% compliance. No questions.
No bartering. No excuses. Nothing.
Just trust. Abram put God first
and showed it by his willingness to let go of everything else.
Do you recognize why Abram’s
response to God’s call seems to stand out as such an exemplary act of
faith? Isn’t it because it’s so rarely
seen today, even within the Church? God
says, “Put me first.” We say, “Alright,
I’m just about to… after I get my financial house in order… once things at work
slow down… at the end of my child’s sports season… when I work out some family
problems – yes, then I’ll most definitely put you first, God.” And then, surprise, surprise, when that is
how we “put God first,” something else always has a way of coming up, doesn’t
it? We say “after this,” but we’re not
really fooling anyone but maybe ourselves, because the “after this” approach
isn’t really a matter of obstacles that keep popping up, but rather a failure
on our part to put God before all those obstacles; to put him first. And you know what’s ironic about the whole
thing? If we stopped to actually put God
first, we might find that all those challenges that used to keep “popping up”
are suddenly no more.
Instead, we run the risk of
so habitually putting everything before God, that he may finally no longer
condescend to playing second fiddle, refuse to allow himself to be ignored any
longer, and take his gospel elsewhere.
Nothing imaginable would be more terrible than that, the prospect of
being permanently separated from God.
So where do we turn when we
reflect on our tragic track record of putting God first? Do we look to Abram and tell ourselves, “I
need to be more like him?” Better than
that, let’s focus on what Abram focused on: God’s promises. One of the promises wrapped up in that cluster
is for you and all people today. God
told Abram, “and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you” (v.3). You have been blessed through Abram, for from
Abram’s line came the blessing of forgiveness and salvation. From Abram’s line came the delivery of God’s
promise of redemption. From Abram’s line
came the Savior, Jesus. Through Jesus,
we are blessed.
Jesus always put his Father
first. One of the most notable instances
happened in Gethsemane, where we gather around and see him agonizing in prayer,
clearly pressed beneath the weight of great spiritual and emotional
strain. He asks his Father if there is
any other way, but always puts him first, ultimately begging that the Father’s
will come before his own. Jesus put the
Father first. By faith you reap the
benefits of Jesus’ devotion to his Father.
By faith in Jesus, you have put God first. By his obedience, Jesus did for you what you
could not, and by his death, he paid for every wrong that you did do and all
that you left undone, including our sin of putting God second, third, fourth,
and anywhere else down on the list.
It was God’s promises to
Abram that enabled him to put God first and trust wholeheartedly that God would
lead and provide. It is God’s promise to
you and me in Christ Jesus that our sin has been forgiven, and by grace, through
faith, God is our number one priority.
Abram displayed that saving
faith by pulling up his tent pegs and moving out. He then displayed that saving faith by
setting up an altar and worshiping God when he arrived in the land to which God
brought him. We, too, show that saving
faith in a number of ways. We desire to
be fed more and more with the food of God’s Word in worship and Bible
study. We intentionally look for
opportunities to serve. We intentionally
look for others to tell about Jesus. We
intentionally look to grow in the grace of giving from wherever we’re at to the
next stage – from occasional and sporadic giving to regular giving, and from
regular giving to increased giving, and from increased giving to 10% giving,
and from 10% giving to extravagant and generous giving. In all these things we show God’s grace at
work in our lives as we grow as believers.
Then, like Abram, we’re willing to go when and where ever God asks,
willing to put all behind and follow him, because that’s what happens when grace
moves us to put God first. Amen.
“For the freer confidence is
from one’s own works, and the more exclusively it is directed toward Christ
alone, so much better is the Christian it makes.” (Luther)
No comments:
Post a Comment