Abram’s Faith and God’s Confirming Covenant

Text: Genesis 15:1-21

Introduction

Chapters 15, 16, & 17, you might be surprised to discover, are really the story of how Abram over and over again struggles with fear in the midst of his faith in God… and of how God over and over again restores and sustains Abram’s faith through his gracious, patient, covenant promises.

The one constant in Abram’s wavering story is God. And we see God’s constancy toward Abram in Genesis 15 as…

I. God Seals His Promise with the Stars (vv.1-6)

1. v.1 After these things—connects this conversation to the events that just transpired in chapter 14, which concluded with Abram refusing wealth from the king of Sodom because he was determined to receive blessing only from the one true God Yahweh.
   1. In response, God says to Abram, “Fear not, your reward will be great; and I myself am your shield. I am your security.”
   2. “After these things” reminds us not only of the immediate context of Abram’s victory over 4 kings, but also of Abraham’s history since leaving his homeland years before.
      1. It has been years since Abram left everything/one he knew to follow God into an unknown land. And Abram’s anxiety is that he still doesn’t have a son, though God promised he would be father of a great nation.
   3. God’s answer to Abram’s struggles? First and foremost, God’s answer is himself! God points Abram to God in order to allay his fears: “Fear not, Abram.” Why not fear? “Because I am your shield.”
      1. God knows that what Abram, and we, need—more than anything else—is to be reminded of who God is. God is everything we will ever need!
2. vv.2-3 But Abram, while believing and following God, is struggling. He is hurting:
   1. Here is almost a scream from Abram, “What can you give me since I’m childless?”
   2. Eliezer of Damascus—Damascus is in Syria. Abram’s only apparent heir is a Syrian servant in Abram’s household. Would Abram’s wealth be given to a pagan after all?
3. vv.4-5 contain God’s reply to Abram’s fearful, tearful cry.
   1. First God says, “Eliezer will not be your heir.” Then God follows up with one of the warmest interactions in all the Bible.
   2. The hope of a child will still linger out of Abram’s grasp for 6 more chapters, and for 25 more years. But God gives Abram a visible sign he can look at—the stars—and be comforted by in the mean time.
4. In v.6, Abram believed the Lord, and God counted it/credited it to him as righteousness.
   1. This is the first time in the Bible when faith and justification are put together, which is why it is four times quoted in the NT.
      1. In his Roman letter, Paul in fact builds his whole theology of salvation/justification by faith on Gen 15:6, to prove that salvation has always been—not by our own works—but through faith in God’s plan of redemption.
      2. God regards Abram as righteous, not because Abram lives a perfect life, but because Abram’s faith—faltering as it was—was in the goodness of God on his behalf.
   2. Abram’s justifying faith was both personal—v.6 he believed in the Lord—and his faith was propositional: in v.1 it was “the word of the Lord” which came to Abram and which Abram then believed.
      1. Both attributes are true of all genuine, saving faith. It is personal/planted in God himself, and it propositional/resting in the rock-solid truth of God’s revealed Word.

II. God Reveals His Future Purposes (vv.7-16)

1. In v.7, God points Abram back to himself yet again: “I am the LORD.”
   1. And in v.8 Abram expresses both his faith and his doubts. He addresses God as the one true God Yahweh. So he is acknowledging/affirming God’s revelation concerning himself: “Yes, Lord you are God.”
      1. But Abram also follows it up with a further question: “how can I know that I will own this land one day, that my offspring will be abundant as the stars?”
2.  In vv.13-16 God shares with Abram at least some of what his redemptive plan will entail. And it is not entirely encouraging!
   1. God says to Abram, “You personally will live a long life and die peacefully, and you will have offspring, but your descendants will go through 400 years of affliction in a foreign land before I deliver them and enable them to possess the land I promised to you.”
   2. These 4 verses prophetically summarize all the events recorded in the remainder of Genesis, and all of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, and Joshua!

III. God Swears by His Own Life (vv.17-21)

1. v.17 When the sun had gone down- this interaction with Abram took longer than it takes us to read it. It began at night with Abram looking up at the stars, and now ends as the sun goes down again.
   1. God has still not answered Abram’s question in v.8 “how can I know that these things will come true?”
   2. Up to this point, God has been more answering Abram’s question from v.2 “What will you give me Lord, seeing I still don’t have children.”
2. But now, in vv.17-21 God answers Abram’s second question, from v.8: “How can I know these things will come true?” and God’s answer is nothing less than shocking!
   1. God had already in vv.9-11 had Abram take certain animals, cut them in half, and lay them out on the ground.
      1. Then God declared to Abram in v.13, “Know for certain” that my promises are going to be fulfilled completely.
   2. Now, in v.17, God shows Abram how Abram can know for certain that God’s covenant with him will come to pass.
      1. God swears by his own life as the great guarantee of the veracity of his words!
3. This covenant ceremony with the slain animals, though perhaps foreign to us, was a common practice/picture for covenant making in ANE culture.
   1. In such ceremonies, it was the normal practice for both parties entering into covenant to slay animals, and then to walk between the dead animal parts as if to say, “If either of us breaks this covenant, may we be slain like these animals.”
   2. But God does something extraordinary! He puts Adam into a dreaming vision-sleep, and then walks through the animals by himself.
      1. God in the form of a smoking oven and flaming torch walks thru the slain beasts. God makes himself the one to bear the curse and penalty for any breach in this covenant.
   3. In Ge 15:12 God confirms his covenant with Abram, not only by appearing to Abram in a sleeping vision, but also with a ‘horror of great darkness’ falling over the area where this covenant was made.
      1. Just as a great darkness that would fall over the land yet again, when the curse of this covenant would be put on Christ, on the cross.
      2. It is no exaggeration to say that in order to honor this covenant with Abram, God would one day bring all his people out of Egypt, and would later bring his Son into the world (Ex 2:23-24; Lk 1:68, 71-73.)

Conclusion

When we, like Abram, look around us and do not see evidence that God is working, we have a great guarantee—even more than the sovereignty of God that we see in the stars holding their place at night.

1. It is that God died in our place. The curse/punishment for our breaking covenant with God has already been paid, and so there is nothing to keep us from God, or to keep God from fulfilling his saving purposes for us.
2. Gen 15:6 says that Abram believed and his faith was counted to him for righteousness.
3. And Paul writes in Rom 4:23-25 “it was not written for [Abram’s] sake alone, that it was imputed to him; but for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead; who was delivered for our offenses, and was raised again for our justification.”