The Wilderness Chronicles: Day 5

Abraham: He didn't see Hebrews

The LORD had said to Abram, "Leave your COUNTRY, your PEOPLE and your FATHER's household and GO to the land I will show you....So Abram left, as the LORD had told him Genesis 12: 1,4a (NIV)

By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, OBEYED AND WENT, even though he DID NOT KNOW where he was going. By faith he made his home in the promised land like a stranger in a foreign country; he lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise Hebrews 11:8-9 (NIV)

....look to Abraham, your father and to Sarah, who gave you birth. When I called him he was but ONE and I blessed him and made him MANY. Isaiah 51:2 (NIV)

A wilderness experience is not unique to me, neither is it to you. In studying my Bible, I am learning that it is a series of wilderness chronicles, the stories and testimonies of men and women who walked with God and for almost all of them there were seasons when they had to stand alone with God. Life is full of sounds but it doesn't matter how much we hear if we never hear the right things. Today, I want to focus on Abraham, a man described as a friend of God, a man who debated with God and could cause God to change his mind on something he set out to do, a man who God discussed with intimately. Yes, Abraham had a great relationship with God but he had his wilderness season where he had to learn to lean on God and walk in His ways and no it wasn't easy.

The first record of God speaking to Abraham in Scripture is God asking Him to relocate. I'm sure most of us have moved homes at least once in our lives and we can attest to how stressful it can be. Sometimes, for the next phase in our lives, it is necessary that we move, it could be to another country, another city or just a different street, sometimes we have to downsize or 'upsize' but the essence of what we are doing is saying goodbye to the life we have right now a.k.a our comfort zone and going on to pastures anew. The difference between us and Abraham however is that God never gave him a destination postcode (that is Zipcode if you're in the US!)just said leave and go. Leave what you know and go to what you don't know? Honestly, the wilderness is a place that shows us for who we are, we may say we trust God, that He knows what is best for us but when He asks us to leave what we know, our present occupation, our present level in him, some relationships, some habits and go to a new place in Him, a place where He says is good but we haven't been to or heard of before, can we like Abraham leave just as the Lord has told us to. Hmm (Selah). It must have been hard, there were some people Abraham left behind that he never saw again but he had heard God and that was good enough for Him. I feel like I am in a season where I have been cut off from some relationships that I felt were my core, it has been so painful but I sense the hand of God stretching me in a way I have never been stretched before. I prayed and I cried, I tried to bribe and people please but the word that came to me was that 'there is a season to embrace and a season to refrain from embracing, it is time to separate from Lot'.

It is important to know God's voice for if we don't how can we heed? In the wilderness, we learn to trust God for it is not a terrain that we are used to for only the Creator can describe the creation. Sometimes we get it wrong, we want to do something and we say the Lord said but if the Lord has said, I encourage you to trust and obey. It may not make sense, I know of people who have left good jobs to go and work in some remote village teaching children Maths and English. I recently watched a documentary of a couple who left their good jobs to work in Haiti for a few years with abandoned children and ended up adopting 6 Haitian children! It may seem difficult to explain to others but trust that God knows what is best. Is it easy? No. Will we make mistakes? Almost definitely yes. Will God be with us? Every step of the way, even when it seems He is silent.

On this journey, Abraham lied (twice) about his relationship with his wife, experienced a painful separation from his cousin, fought a battle to rescue same cousin, isn't it painful when God asks you to meet the needs of someone who has stabbed you in the back!!, waited years for a child, put same child on the altar, mourned the loss of his dearly beloved wife. Yet, through the ups and downs of the journey, he never knew that one day his name would make the hall of faith, he didn't see Hebrews. He was simply walking with God, one step at a time, one day at a time. I'm sure he must have been disappointed, he's a man I love because he was quite candid with God but in the end he was victorious because he walked in faith. Hallelujah! Isaiah encourages us all through Abraham, that there are seasons where we feel alone, not so much because we are in the Sahara but because we are in a place where we can't take others too, it is our wilderness experience, that even from what seems so small, from one, when we add the blessings of God, we shall experience breakthrough. Amen, I receive that in Jesus name.

I pray that this becomes my testimony, familiar is good and comforting but may become a bondage. I don't see all my future holds but I see God in it and when He calls my prayer is to follow.

Leave
what you know
and I know
Go
where you don't know
and I know
Trust
that I know
what you don't know
Believe
that I can
when you can't
See
through my eyes
Hold
tight to me
Stretch
beyond your comfort zone
Cry
if you must but
Move
for there are greater things in store
I AM WITH YOU ALWAYS