finding ourselves in the story

 

This Sunday, I shall be speaking about Abraham, who is also known as the father of faith. We meet him in Genesis, the first book of the Bible, the origin-stories.

By way of context, we first meet his father, Terah. Terah lived in what today we would call southern Iraq, and had three sons, Abram, Nahor and Haran. Haran pre-deceases his father, and after this loss, Terah determines to set out for Canaan. He is searching for something, and though it is not made explicit, the implications is that he is searching for the God who will be known by his son Abram. His eldest son and his orphaned grandson go with him, while his other surviving son chooses to remain in the place he knows. They travel north along the Fertile Crescent between the rivers Tigris and Euphrates, until they reach the foothills of the mountains of what we know as Turkey, coming to a place called Haran. It is a different language, different root and meaning, but the name sounds like the name of his dead son. Whether that is painful, or comforting, or both, Terah finds himself unable to go any further, settling and eventually dying there.

It is possible that Terah’s story is your story. I meet quite a few people who have an innate sense that God exists, and even a strong hunch that he might be encountered in a church, in the local church I serve; who make a plan to turn up at public worship, but who — for a variety of reasons — just can’t get over the threshold. It is too daunting. I know others who come every week, perhaps out of force of habit or sense of duty, but who carry some sense of loss that prevents them from knowing God as fully as they had hoped, or once did. Terah’s story is not unusual; but more is possible.

After Terah dies, the Lord God speaks to Abram. And that is noteworthy in itself. The story takes it for granted that God speaks, to humans. And not just to vanishingly rare Important People. If God speaks to the father of faith, anyone who traces their heritage back to Abraham — Jews, Christians, Muslims — should expect to hear this God speak to them, too. To hear God’s voice. To learn to recognise the voice of God, the things that God would say to us.

And what God says is, Get out, get away — there is a sense of urgency here — from your country and your kindred and your father’s house. Not because these things don’t matter, but because God does not want us to find our security in them. Because, ultimately, these things aren’t secure. Who settles, and who rules over, geography changes continuously over time, not only over long stretches of time but in a continually ebb and flow. Culture changes, from generation to generation, so that you are quickly left behind by the concerns, the vocabulary, of the generation below you. Family can be a source of strength, but also of wounding, of enmity, of division. The word for ‘house’ can also be translated ‘palace’ or ‘dungeon’: families can exercise a hold over us; even where we love and are loved by our families, they can prevent us from going beyond where we now are.

Jesus will call these things — sources of privilege such as ethnicity, nationality, socio-economic background, gender, sexuality, education — the flesh, saying flesh gives birth to flesh but the Spirit of God gives birth to the spirit. It is also noteworthy that Jesus called the Temple in Jerusalem ‘my Father’s house,’ and for some, our cherished church practices can become a dungeon that imprisons us. If that is your story, the Spirit of God wants to set you free.

Instead of in these things, God wants Abram to find security in God. In knowing himself to be a child of God. In knowing God to be a loving Father. As my wife would put it, knowing WHO you are, and knowing WHOSE you are.

(Abram means Great, or Exalted, Father. But Abram is childless. He has no heir. His name is as unwelcome as a Best Dad In The World mug to a man with low sperm count. But God wants to bring healing to Abram, first by showing Abram that he, God, is a Loving Father, and in time by giving Abram a new name, Abraham, the Father of a Multitude, the father of all who follow in his footsteps walking with God.)

God calls Abram — and his descendants — out of every familiar source of hoped-for security, to become foreigners wherever they find themselves. To identify with the immigrants, those on the outside of national identity, cultural identity, self-interest. To be a significant sub-group within the host people but not of the host people. To be, as immigrant communities usually are, a community who seek to bless the host people. To serve their neighbours. To add value.

God tells Abram that if he sets out on this adventure, he will meet two kinds of people. He will meet those who bless him, who affirm him, encourage him, those who ask how they can support him. And he will meet those who curse him, who speak ill of him, on account of his faith, who oppose him. God tells Abram to expect both responses, and that God will multiply blessing wherever the intention to bless is found; and frustrate all intention to curse Abram, working to constrain evil, to transform it effectively against itself by bringing good out of actions intended for harm.

If you have set out on the journey of faith in the footsteps of Abram, you can expect to encounter the same reactions. We should not be surprised by this. We can give thanks for openness and hostility, for invitations and challenges, for favour and frustration, all as signs of still being on the path to a destination we don’t yet fully know, in the company of a trustworthy guide.

Maybe you recognise yourself in the story of Abram. Of faith, stalled by circumstances. Of the search for security — identity, meaning — in structures that are, inherently, unstable. Or perhaps of feeling like an outsider, and feeling alone, not part of a mighty people-group. Maybe you want to be a blessing, but struggle to see yourself in such terms, as something — someone — who is a gift to the world. Or perhaps you are struggling with the hostile reaction of others towards the things that matter to you.

Abraham’s story is the story of his descendants in faith. If that story resonates with you — if anything above intrigues you — I’d love to talk to you about that, to hear your story. To bless you. And to pray for you, that you would see and hear and know God more clearly.

If you are geographically local to me, you’d be most welcome to join us on Sunday morning, at 10.30 a.m. at St Nicholas Church, Sunderland

Genesis 12.1-4

‘Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” So Abram went, as the Lord had told him; and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran.’