The Second Sunday in Lent: Genesis 12: 1-4a

This brief snippet from Genesis concerns Abram's call. God's voice dominates the reading:

"Go
from your land, your relatives, your father's house
to the land which I will cause you to see.
I will make you a great nation; I will bless you; I will make great your name.
So, be a blessing!
I will bless the ones who bless you, and the ones who curse you I will curse.
And all the families of the earth will be blessed by you."

The speech has four parts: 1) Go!; 2) from here to there; 3) in order that I might do something to you; 4) with the result that others are affected by this action.

First, the command comes to Abram to go forth. He is the only recipient of this particular Hebrew imperative in the Hebrew Bible; he will hear it again in the command to take Isaac to Moriah and sacrifice him. On one level, the directive concerns a physical, geographical move: Abram is to leave Haran for Canaan. On another level, the directive involves transforming an individual, his wife, and his nephew into a great nation. The command also arrives when Abram is clearly an adult with a family, yet at the beginning of the biblical narrative regarding him. We know little about Abram at this point in Genesis. Yet, the divine command comes. This command is immediately obeyed by Abram in verse 4: "And Abram went just as The Living God commanded him." God says "go" and Abram "went." Same verb—the first an imperative calling forth an action, the second a past tense demonstrating his willingness to journey.

Second, Abram is called to leave three settings: his land, his relatives, his father's house. Each of these settings is an important identity marker for Abram (or any ancient Western Asian) with theological import. To leave land in a society that requires it for survival is risky. To leave the clan of relatives in a society that values family traditions and connections is to walk away from protection and societal acceptance. To leave the father's house, in Hebrew the bet av, in a society centered on this most basic societal unit, is to leave support and livelihood.  Abram leaves these settings to journey to an unspecified land. We perhaps read into the command that Abram will journey, of course, to Canaan. But God's call is not as clear. It is a place that God will reveal. Abram leaves familiarity, comfort, and stability to travel to an unknown land of questionable quality.

Third, God promises blessing and to create a nation out of Abram. These two are tied together. Blessing is typically articulated in Genesis and the Old Testament as connected to children and land.

Finally, God's concern extends beyond Abram. Abram is not blessed with nationhood and reputation for his own sake. Blessing does not come to a single family alone. Abram is called to be a blessing to all the families of the earth. He is called to move from an egocentric to a worldcentric understanding of blessing.

The Old Testament Selections for Lent in Year A

The Old Testament lectionary selections for Lent in Year A follow the order of the biblical canon: The Garden of Eden story, Abram’s call, Moses gets water from a rock, Samuel anoints ruddy David as king, and the Valley of Dry Bones. This order allows the minister to retell five compelling and individual stories from the Old Testament. In addition to these important and distinct narratives, the Lenten season during Year A provides an opportunity to link them into an evolving, larger narrative about God and humanity that can lead into the explicitly Christian story of Jesus during Holy Week.

A Benediction (Or Miscellaneous Thoughts)

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