Scroll to the bottom for thoughts/discussion questions!
One-sentence summary: God tells Abram to leave his family and go to a land He will show him, Abram lies and tells a king Sarai is his sister, Melchizedek blesses Abram, and God makes a covenant with Abram to give him all the land and become a father of many nations.
We are back in Genesis, and a lot happens here!
God speaks to Abram and tells him to leave his country, family, and father's house and GO to a place where God will show him. God promises to make of him a great nation and name, that he will be a blessing, and that God will bless those who bless him and curse those who curse him. Also, that through him, all the nations of the earth will be blessed.
Abram takes his wife Sarai along with his nephew Lot and all his possessions and goes to the land of Canaan. The Lord appears again and says that He will give this land to his descendants. Abram builds an altar to the Lord there. During a famine, he travels down to Egypt. Upon entering Egypt, he asks Sarai to lie to the Egyptians and say that she is his sister so that they will not kill him and try to take her, as she is very beautiful. In Egypt, the Pharaoh does indeed see that she is beautiful (at 75!) and takes her, giving Abram many gifts in exchange. However, God causes a plague to come upon Pharaoh's household, whereupon the king calls Abram and confronts him. (He apparently had not yet taken Sarai to be his wife.) Abram is sent away along with everything he has.
Abram travels to the south, at which point he separates from Lot, as the land cannot contain both of them and their herdsman. Lot chooses the plains of the Jordan and settles near Sodom, although the men of Sodom were "wicked against the Lord," while Abram pitches his tent in Canaan.
Once Lot departs from Abram, God speaks to him again and tells him to "look north, south, east, and west," that all the land he sees God will give to him and his descendants. He says He will make them like the dust of the earth, that if he could count the dust, he could number his descendants. He tells Abram to walk all throughout the land. Abram builds an altar again.
The kings in the land make war, and Sodom is captured, along with Lot. Abram receives the news and rallies his trained men to pursue and attack. All the goods are brought back, and the king of Sodom goes to meet Abram in the Valley of Kings.
A mysterious man is introduced named Melchizedek, known only as the king of Salem (which means peace) and a "priest of God Most High." He goes down to the valley and blesses Abram, and Abram pays him a tithe (tenth) of all the spoils. The king of Sodom tells Abram to take all the goods, but Abram refuses so that it cannot be said that anyone made him rich but God.
The Lord comes to Abram again in a vision and tells him not to be afraid, that He is "[his] shield, [his] very great reward." Abram asks God what He will give him, since he is a childless, with only a household servant to become his heir. God says that this will not be, and that Abram will produce his own son and heir. He takes Abram outside to count the stars, and again tells him that his descendants will be innumerable. Abram believes God, and God "[credits] it to him as righteousness."
God reminds Abram of who He is and what He has promised. Abram asks God how he can be sure God will fulfill His promise (a question God doesn't seem to mind, so long as it is asked in faith), so God "cuts a covenant" with Abram, while at the same time warning Abram in a dream that his descendants will be in captivity (in Egypt) for 400 years. He promises to afterward bring them out and give them the land.
Thoughts/Questions:
What do you think it was like for Abram, leaving all he knew?
Have you ever been at a place in your life where God really had to be "enough" for you?
God's promise to Abram, and to us today, rests on His faithfulness, Who He is and what He says He will do. Our part is to believe.