“…in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” (Genesis 12:3)
God has asked Abram (we often know of him as “Abraham”) to leave the security of his home and make a journey to a new place. He is to take what he can with him, but he will be leaving behind even more. And the promise to him is that, if he does what God asks and trusts God to do what God has promised, that the world will be better off as a result. In fact, all the families of the world will be blessed by this – not just Abram’s.
Abram was in his 70s when this request to him was made. Even by today’s standards, he was a senior citizen. He and his wife Sarah had been unable to have children. His legacy and his lineage seemed to be close to an end. The thought that he would leave the comfort of his property (Abram was well off) and risk it for the sake of some nebulous promise seems daunting. But trust it he did. And history was changed.
Almost all of us at one time or another dream of being involved in something that makes a long-term difference in the world. Yet we also almost always decide that we are just little old us and that perhaps our lives are insignificant and that we can’t make a difference. The upcoming election season even makes many of us cynical. “Why bother? It isn’t going to matter anyway!”
The Bible reminds all of us that God uses faithful people to do great things not great people. Read on and you’ll see that Abraham and Sarah are both faithful and fallible. They are far from perfect people. But God’s commitment to work in the lives of people who will respond to the call is unwavering. Your life, like the lives of many people of faith before you, matters to God and can make a difference in the world God loves.
