Genesis Chapter 12
Heavenly Father, as I come before you today. I thank you for the person reading this right now. I pray for stillness and silence, so that they can hear your directions, amongst any chaos that may cloud them. As You take Your time with them, may endurance and understanding, be their portion. Please lead the way for them, guard them and elevate them, in every area of their lives. May Your light illuminate their paths, with hope and clarity, in the mighty name of Jesus, I pray. Amen.
Welcome back Brothers and Sisters, to The Heartfelt Studies. I hope you're doing well. Here's to a new week and a new chapter, so lets jump into Genesis Chapter 12.
Abram Journeys To Egypt
Genesis Chapter 12, verses 1-3:
Sometimes in life, we are unsure as to where to go or which directions to take, but when God directs us, it's always to help us, even when we don't understand it and we see this in Abram.
After being in Haran, God instructs Abram to leave his country, his family and his Father's house and to go to somewhere else. Imagine, being told to leave everything you know? It must be hard right? But as we know, God's plans is always for our good.
In these verses, we see that should Abram obey God's commands, God will do amazing things for him. God promises that he will bless Abram exceedingly and abundantly, in the following areas:
Making a great nation for Abram.
Making Abram's name great (exalted, distinguished)
Abram will be a blessing to others.
God will bless, those who bless Abram and he will curse those who curses Abram.
All the families of the earth will be blessed.
So we see here, that God's promises goes above and beyond. He will not only bless Abram, but his promises extends onto Abram's family and to those who close and willing to do good to Abram. This shows us, that whenever God chooses to bless us, he can do more, than we can ever imagine. When we are blessed, we can be a blessing to others also, but we have to learn to have faith and to trust God's directions and plans over our lives.
Genesis Chapter 12, verses 4-6:
Abram obeys God commands and leaves Haran with his wife Sarai, his Nephew Lot, their servants and their possessions. Abram was seventy five years old, when he left Haran and set off to the Land of Canaan (reaching as far as the site of Shechem, to the terebinth (oak) tree of Moreh, where the Canaanites were in the land at that time.
So we can only imagine the emotions Abram and his family were going through at this time, after being in one place for so long.
As we may know, change is a part of life and we never know how good it can be for us, until we make it and this is just to start of something amazing for Abram.
Genesis Chapter 12, verses 7-9:
God is a merciful and loving God, who is always there whenever we need him. We read here, that as Abram reaches the Land of Canaan, God appeared to him, declaring that he will give Abram's descendants the land. Is that not a beautiful gesture?
So what did Abram do? He built an altar to honor God. God appreciates when we show him gratitude, but when we openly (with good intentions) show gratitude for him. Abram done this, to express his heartfelt appreciation on how far God has brought him and his family and will continue to do their in lives.
But how how else did Abram honor God? Abram worshiped God, by; praising, praying and showing thanksgiving to God. As we already know, prayer and praise unlocks a powerful and a deeper connection with God and Abram put all he had spiritually on the altar for God, to show God gratitude, before continuing his journey towards the South of Judah (Negev).
Genesis Chapter 12, verses 10-16:
Here, we see Abram goes to the land of Egypt where he is to live temporarily and finds that there is a sever famine in the land. What’s interesting here, is that he tells his wife Sarai that she must announce herself as his sister and not as his wife. Why? Because of Sarai’s beauty, Abram feels that the Egyptians will kill him, so they can take her, as their wife.
Abram doing this, shows us that he was only thinking about himself in this situation, because of the potential danger, he felt may occur. This is very unfair to Sarai for making her be untruthful, but it is also unfair, Abram was only thinking about himself and not the potential danger that could arise for Sarai, as we read that Pharaoh’s Princes take Sarai in (for the purpose of marriage to Pharaoh) and they treated Abram very well because of this situation, which must have been despairing for Sarai as she could not reject this proposal.
These verses also brings us back to God’s promise. God promised to bless Abram abundantly in all areas of his life. However, Abram’s fearfulness allowed him to forget how great God is and what he could do and Abram’s actions shows that he did not have faith or trust in God to protect him.
This just shows us, that sometimes we can let our actions delay our faith and without faith, we can get ourselves into situations, that God didn’t want us to be in and in the next verses, we will see how events will play for Abram and Sarai after this first step of deception.
Genesis Chapter 12, verses 17-20:
Isn’t God devoted and trusted to his children? As we remember his promises to Abram, we see them unfold. Although Abram’s deception was not a good thing to do, God steps in to save him and therefore punishes Pharaoh and his household with a severe plague. We see that Pharaoh responds, with acknowledgement that Sarai is Abram’s wife and angrily asks Abram, why he told such a lie, although we do not see how this information was made known to him. However, with Pharaoh questioning Abram directly, it shows us he is aware that his actions are a cause of sin and because of this, Pharaoh then commands his men to escort Abram, Sarai and all that was with them away.
This shows us the beauty in God’s grace, because despite what Abram done, God still kept his promise to protect and bless Abram, even when he didn’t ask for it. Isn’t it a beautiful thing, that God can still use us, despite our flaws? It doesn’t mean that can do what we want and expect God to just bless us, but it’s a lesson to remind us, that our relationship with God is special. He sees and hears all things, he surrounds us with his mercy and his love, even when we feel unworthy of it. This will remind Abram, to have faith and trust that God can and will deliver his promises always.
Thoughts
Genesis Chapter 12, has uplifted me, because, it filled my heart with gratitude and appreciation that I have a God who is patient with me. I know that many times, I have allowed my emotions, to cause me so much sadness and pain when it was needed and I couldn’t get myself out it straight away. So I had to just stop one day, breathe, break down and worship God, until I felt the layers coming off. So this chapter reminds me that, we can cloud our minds with so many other things, which leads us into anxiety and fear. Yes, we are human and it is okay to feel this, but God wants us to seek him first in all things and when we focus our hearts and minds on him and on how great, how wonderful, how faithful and merciful he is, then we can overcome situations, because his word and promises will never fail us.
If you have anything to share with me, then let me know in the comments.
Catch you back here soon Xx