The Covenants - Part 2
The Abrahamic Covenant
Abram’s father was 205 when he died (Genesis 11:32). Abram was 75 when he received the first promise of his future blessings: that all families would be blessed through his descendants (Gen. 12:1-4). “Abram went forth” — he believed G-d and was obedient to Him.
So Abram and his family are moving as G-d instructed and now in Genesis 12:7 Adonai appears to Abram and says, “this is the land that I will give your descendants.” Two things are worth noting here:
- G-d appears to Abram.
- Abram is 75 years old at this point and he has no offspring. That is kind of vital to make descendants. In spite of that we see him build an altar thanking G-d for this promise. He believes G-d.
Abram and Lot continue on their journey. They stop for a time in Egypt during a famine. After a while they leave Egypt and go to the Negev. There Abram and Lot separate and in Genesis 13:14-18 G-d restates the promise of giving this land to Abram’s descendants.
Now we will begin to see why G-d thinks so highly of Abram. In Genesis 14 some kings and peoples of the area raid Sodom and Gomorrah. They plunder the cities and kidnap Abram’s nephew, Lot. Abram finds out and he sets out and rescues Lot. It is a great story which also mentions Melchizedek, the “king of Salem” (Salem was an early name for Jerusalem which means City of Peace), who the writer of Hebrews refers to as the “King of Peace” and compares to Yeshua as having no beginning and no end in Hebrews 7:1-3. But that is another study. In Gen. 14:21-24 the king of Sodom offers Abram riches. Abram rejects them and we see his faith in G-d’s provision and blessing. We see him honoring an oath he made to G-d. We see Abram’s righteousness in his life not just before G-d, but man also.
In Genesis 15 we begin to see Abram questioning the promise of many descendants. He questions G-d because he has no children and he is already old. G-d assures him that he will have a descendant and Gen. 15:6 says, “he believed Adonai and He reckoned it to him as righteousness.”
After believing G-d Abram asks for a covenant. Gen. 15:8 says, “how may I know that I will possess it?” (The “it” here being the promised land and descendants.) So G-d tells him how they will make the covenant in Gen. 15:9-21.
Abram obeys G-d’s instructions. He takes the animals and cuts them in two, except the birds. Then he lays the halves out on either side of two slopes that come together in a shallow valley. This way the blood flows into the valley in the middle making a path. In that day each party of an agreement (a “covenant”) would then walk through the blood basically saying, “if I break this covenant may this — may what has been done to these animals — be done to me.” Now if we continue reading we see Abram goes into a deep sleep and G-d walks through the blood between the animals. There is no indication that Abram walks through. Abram didn’t walk through because he could not walk through. There is no way he, a man, could keep a covenant like this with G-d who is perfect. But G-d walked through letting Abram know that this covenant would be kept.
Genesis 16 shows that we are now 10 years from the original promise. Instead of 75 Abram is now 85 and still has no heir, but this chapter brings Hagar and a potential heir of Ishmael. We won’t focus on them because the covenant we are discussing continues through Isaac, not Ishmael. I will only comment that when Ishmael was born Abram was 86 years old.
Genesis 17 skips forward another 13 years and Abram is now 99 years old. Adonai here appears to Abram again and says that his descendants will be a multitude. You get the sense here that Abram is just listening for the first bit. G-d blesses him, changes his name to Abraham, gives him the covenant of circumcision, changes Sarai’s name to Sarah and promises that Abraham’s heir will be born through Sarah. Now Abraham laughs. He tells G-d that he and Sarah are old. Sarah is past her child-bearing years. Why not just make the covenant with Ishmael? G-d tells Abraham that He will bless Ishmael, but Isaac and his descendants will be the heirs to the covenant (Gen. 17:20-21).
The covenant in Genesis 17 was sealed by circumcision. It is the sign of the covenant — a reminder of the blessings G-d has promised. There is a cutting — another spilling of blood to seal the covenant — as with every covenant. There is also a permanent sign on a man, who is the spiritual head of the home, which serves as a reminder of the covenant Abraham made with G-d. It also serves as a continuation of that covenant between man and G-d when a man has his son circumcised on the 8th day, as it was commanded. It is also interesting to me that G-d gave this covenant at such a time that Isaac would be one of the first to receive the fullness of the covenant, being circumcised eight days after his birth.
This is also interesting because it narrows the focus of the covenants. The previous covenants we studied between G-d and Adam and between G-d and Noah were for them and for their descendants. In each case their descendants included the entire human race. The covenants with Abraham are for only hist descendants. His descendants are the Jews and also his spiritual children who walk righteously before G-d as he did.
Abraham obediently circumcised all the males in his house. After that there are a few chapters with various stories including G-d’s judgment and destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. Finally in Genesis 21:1-8 Isaac is born.
Get the setting here: this is twenty-five years after G-d’s first promise to Abram. Finally Abraham begins to see the fulfillment with a true heir at 100 years old. Through the whole process Abraham trusted G-d to be faithful and G-d proved to be faithful.
In Genesis 22:1-19 we see Abraham again honoring G-d. We see him again standing righteously before G-d as G-d asks him to sacrifice his son. This is his heir. The boy he waited 25 years to have at 100 years old. He obediently follows G-d’s instructions until G-d stops him in the middle. Because of Abraham’s faithfulness G-d confirms all the blessing on Abraham and restates that all the families of the earth will be blessed through Abraham’s seed.
A little over 1500 years later another Father would offer His Son on the same or a very close mountain to establish a further covenant with those whose spiritual father is Abraham. We will study that covenant later. Our next study is the Mosaic covenant. David Swanger will be teaching us about that one at our next meeting.