No welcome, no cutting of tape, just getting there.
Abram took his wife and his nephew and all the people who were connected with him and set out for Canaan, and so he came to the land of Canaan (Genesis 12.1)
When David and I loaded our little boys, age just 4 and almost 2 and drove away from that little chapel building in the back streets of Leeds, we and all our family and friends were mindful of Abraham leaving behind the place where he had lived, and his relatives. We were eager to go because we wanted to spread the news of blessing. We wanted to tell people living in Japan that God’s intention for humanity was to bless them, and bless them again and again. Abram received the promise; we were among a long line of carriers of the promise.
My Father had prayed that there would be no bad thing happen to us on our journey to London. On the way (on the old A1) the car stopped suddenly and violently, the motor cyclists behind us had no time to stop and pitched into the car at speed. No one was hurt, I forget all the details about getting the car serviced on a Sunday, but I remember the explanation: The brakes had simply seized up because the car was brand new, and new cars sometimes did seize up until all the parts had settled down. (This was 1954, and our car was the least expensive kind that Ford made.) When we spoke by phone to my Father he was bewildered. “But I prayed that nothing would happen to you,” he said. Father knew very well that bad things happen to people who are trying to serve God. He said no more but I think (to use biblical language) that he was being warned by God. God was; in fact saying “Don’t expect this journey of theirs to be easy, glorious, or even successful.” Father never got ashamed or exasperated because we did not write home about mighty miracles and earth changing successes. Everyone else did, here they were spending ‘all that money’ (Actually it was ridiculously little) to re-experience the success that missionaries in the heart of Africa were having and we only wrote home with apologetic stories about little groups, and small beginnings.
So, I wonder, did Abram have difficulties when his band of people set out to go to a place that God had told them to go to? Or was it all simple. He traveled a route that bordered the Mediterranean Sea; .there was other families also making the emigration journey from Haran and from Ur. The route was fairly simple, traveled by merchants carrying imported goods. About 17 miles each day from one small settlement to another. No visible angels attended his way, and no celestial lights lit up when he reached Shecham and knew that he had arrived. There is a comfort in being able to say, “I did what God wanted me to do.” But there is also often a sense of anti-climax. What do I do next? Abram was to live in that country of Canaan, traveling from pasture land to pasture land, still trusting the God who spoke to him, and to become a blessing to all those around him. He was to continue the spiritual journey that had started with a geographical journey. His spiritual journey was to experience God in ways new to Abram. You and I are called to that same journey, Because we all have the opportunity of a spiritual journey, because for many of us our life is a spiritual pilgrimage even if we never leave the town where we were born: for this reason I write about Abram’s journey and hope you will write about yours. God had promised to give him the land, but it did not become his, God had promised to make his name great, but he was just a rich nomad, his wife was still barren, famines, and kings continued to threaten his existence. Abrams journey to Canaan had been made, did he sometimes look up to the sky in bewilderment and ask, “Is this all you want me to do, God?” He lived his life traveling around the place he had gone to, feeding his flocks and serving the One God and waiting, waiting, waiting, for God to keep the promise he had made to him. .
So how does this apply to us today? We have made the spiritual journey we felt called to make and arrived at a state of commitment and obedience to the One God, but nothing else seems to have happened, our lives continue changed from before but no wonderful climax presents itself to us. We are inheritors of the promise made to Abram but it seems that for a while all that is required of us is to stay faithful.
While we are moving around in geography another kind of journey is happening inside us: a spiritual journey. As we share our life with God that life becomes a pilgrimage, an inner journey, with land marks and characteristics that we remember but are not visible to anyone else. We journey in faith towards a promised future and the journey becomes a fantastic adventure of conversation with God, decisions made with him, actions done in his name and eventually praise that comes naturally and is happily directed toward the God of Promise. In a small way we are being Abram.
When David and I loaded our little boys, age just 4 and almost 2 and drove away from that little chapel building in the back streets of Leeds, we and all our family and friends were mindful of Abraham leaving behind the place where he had lived, and his relatives. We were eager to go because we wanted to spread the news of blessing. We wanted to tell people living in Japan that God’s intention for humanity was to bless them, and bless them again and again. Abram received the promise; we were among a long line of carriers of the promise.
My Father had prayed that there would be no bad thing happen to us on our journey to London. On the way (on the old A1) the car stopped suddenly and violently, the motor cyclists behind us had no time to stop and pitched into the car at speed. No one was hurt, I forget all the details about getting the car serviced on a Sunday, but I remember the explanation: The brakes had simply seized up because the car was brand new, and new cars sometimes did seize up until all the parts had settled down. (This was 1954, and our car was the least expensive kind that Ford made.) When we spoke by phone to my Father he was bewildered. “But I prayed that nothing would happen to you,” he said. Father knew very well that bad things happen to people who are trying to serve God. He said no more but I think (to use biblical language) that he was being warned by God. God was; in fact saying “Don’t expect this journey of theirs to be easy, glorious, or even successful.” Father never got ashamed or exasperated because we did not write home about mighty miracles and earth changing successes. Everyone else did, here they were spending ‘all that money’ (Actually it was ridiculously little) to re-experience the success that missionaries in the heart of Africa were having and we only wrote home with apologetic stories about little groups, and small beginnings.
So, I wonder, did Abram have difficulties when his band of people set out to go to a place that God had told them to go to? Or was it all simple. He traveled a route that bordered the Mediterranean Sea; .there was other families also making the emigration journey from Haran and from Ur. The route was fairly simple, traveled by merchants carrying imported goods. About 17 miles each day from one small settlement to another. No visible angels attended his way, and no celestial lights lit up when he reached Shecham and knew that he had arrived. There is a comfort in being able to say, “I did what God wanted me to do.” But there is also often a sense of anti-climax. What do I do next? Abram was to live in that country of Canaan, traveling from pasture land to pasture land, still trusting the God who spoke to him, and to become a blessing to all those around him. He was to continue the spiritual journey that had started with a geographical journey. His spiritual journey was to experience God in ways new to Abram. You and I are called to that same journey, Because we all have the opportunity of a spiritual journey, because for many of us our life is a spiritual pilgrimage even if we never leave the town where we were born: for this reason I write about Abram’s journey and hope you will write about yours. God had promised to give him the land, but it did not become his, God had promised to make his name great, but he was just a rich nomad, his wife was still barren, famines, and kings continued to threaten his existence. Abrams journey to Canaan had been made, did he sometimes look up to the sky in bewilderment and ask, “Is this all you want me to do, God?” He lived his life traveling around the place he had gone to, feeding his flocks and serving the One God and waiting, waiting, waiting, for God to keep the promise he had made to him. .
So how does this apply to us today? We have made the spiritual journey we felt called to make and arrived at a state of commitment and obedience to the One God, but nothing else seems to have happened, our lives continue changed from before but no wonderful climax presents itself to us. We are inheritors of the promise made to Abram but it seems that for a while all that is required of us is to stay faithful.
While we are moving around in geography another kind of journey is happening inside us: a spiritual journey. As we share our life with God that life becomes a pilgrimage, an inner journey, with land marks and characteristics that we remember but are not visible to anyone else. We journey in faith towards a promised future and the journey becomes a fantastic adventure of conversation with God, decisions made with him, actions done in his name and eventually praise that comes naturally and is happily directed toward the God of Promise. In a small way we are being Abram.
posted by Jessie Coates at 11:56 AM
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