Advent Podcast - Episode 6 - The Sixth Day of Advent

The Call of Abraham

Genesis 12:1-9, 15:1-5 - Read by Shelley Tumlin
1 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. 2 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. 3 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.”

4 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. 5 Abram took his wife Sarai and his brother’s son Lot, and all the possessions that they had gathered, and the persons whom they had acquired in Haran; and they set forth to go to the land of Canaan. When they had come to the land of Canaan, 6 Abram passed through the land to the place at Shechem, to the oak of Moreh. At that time the Canaanites were in the land. 7 Then the Lord appeared to Abram, and said, “To your offspring I will give this land.” So he built there an altar to the Lord, who had appeared to him. 8 From there he moved on to the hill country on the east of Bethel, and pitched his tent, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east; and there he built an altar to the Lord and invoked the name of the Lord. 9 And Abram journeyed on by stages toward the Negeb.
 
1 After these things the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision, “Do not be afraid, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great.” 2 But Abram said, “O Lord God, what will you give me, for I continue childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?” 3 And Abram said, “You have given me no offspring, and so a slave born in my house is to be my heir.” 4 But the word of the Lord came to him, “This man shall not be your heir; no one but your very own issue shall be your heir.” 5 He brought him outside and said, “Look toward heaven and count the stars, if you are able to count them.” Then he said to him, “So shall your descendants be.”
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Reflection
​Our reading today tells us that Abraham was called to leave his country and his people to settle in a place yet unknown. But that’s not all Abraham was called to do; he was also called to wait. He had to wait for God to tell him which city to travel to next. He had to wait on God to make him a blessing to all nations. And as part of this blessing, Abraham had to wait for God give him an heir and fulfill the promise that his descendants would be as numerous as the stars in heaven.
Waiting can be so difficult! In an era of next-day shipments, fast-food restaurants and instant messaging, we’re likely to have far less patience than Abraham. For most of 2020 we’ve been waiting – waiting for an end to the COVID-19 pandemic, waiting to pull off our face masks, to shake hands, to hug one another, to gather together in the same room to worship and fellowship, and to sing together at top of our lungs.  Now, here we are in Advent, another time of waiting, but it’s less like waiting in line at the grocery store and more like the hopeful anticipation of a pregnant mother waiting for the birth of her child. And that’s where the Advent readings ultimately take us, to the birth of a child - the Christ Child.

Today, our Advent reading tells of the promise of another significant birth of a child, that of Abraham and Sarah’s son Isaac. But Abraham and Sarah had to wait, and in that waiting God was teaching them to trust in him. Advent is a time when we should show our trust in God by embracing “the waiting” with the same kind of hopeful anticipation as Abraham and Sarah, knowing that Jesus Christ, the long-awaited son, will return just as he promised.

Our King and Savior is drawing near!
O come, let us adore him!