There is a great deal happening in this chapter – God makes several commitments to Abram (now called Abraham as of v5) and describes the the covenant in detail.
” ‘I will make you very fruitful; I will make nations of you, and kings will come from you. I will establish my covenant as an everlasting covenant between me and you and your descendants after you for the generations to come, to be your God and the God of your descendants after you. The whole land of Canaan, where you now reside as a foreigner, I will give as an everlasting possession to you and your descendants after you; and I will be their God. You are to undergo circumcision, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and you.’ ” (v6-8,11)
God makes several promises to Abraham:
– Make many nations of you
– Kings will come from your lineage
– There will be an everlasting covenant between God & Abraham’s descendants
– The land of Canaan will remain with his descendants
– Sarah and Abraham will have a son Isaac within the year
– Ismael will become a mighty nation as well, though the covenant will be through Isaac
There is far too much material here to to cover all of these promises in detail, so I’ll try to summarize a few of the big ones.
– Ishmael, whom the Angel of the Lord saved in ch16, becomes the father of the Arab nations. The tradition of Islam, the second largest belief system in the world after Christianity, emerged from these people (followers of Islam are called Muslims).
– Abraham’s future son, Isaac, who is the future father of Jacob (later renamed Israel), becomes another patriarch of the Hebrew (and later Christian) traditions. It’s also from this lineage that David, and eventually Jesus are born.
– Canaan (ie. the Promised Land) eventually comes under Israelite possession (and is lost and is regained a few times). This will happen much later though, in Joshua’s time (stay tuned, we’ll eventually get there)
The last thing I’ll briefly touch on is the physical symbol of the covenant – circumcision. This act of obedience was to signify that Abraham and his descendants were under a covenant with God. This is the one and only thing God asked Abraham to do in order to keep up his end of the covenant. This physical circumcision under the Old Covenant (a.k.a. the law), is later replaced by a spiritual circumcision under the New Covenant (Christ). They discuss this transition quite a bit in the early church (eg. in Acts 15:1-35). Circumcision under the New Covenant is still setting oneself apart for God, though it’s through core beliefs and outward behavior (eg. abstaining from pagan/worldly practices), not a physical change to the person.
It’s hard to say what my takeaway from this is, though I am again reminded of the importance of trusting in the promises of God. Though Abraham (and later Sarah) laughed at the idea of having a child at 90+ years old, God still made it happen. I will continue to lean on the promises of God, not matter how unbelievable they may seem, and I will do my best to remain set apart for His service.
~ Conqueror in Training