Walking in the Dark
“Yahweh said to Abram, “Go forth from your country, from your homeland, and from your father’s house to a land which I will show you.”” Genesis 12:1
Go forth – The first time that the Lord speaks to Abram, He gives a command to go. More than one hundred years later, Abraham will hear that same command (Genesis 22:1). Between the first and the last pronouncement of God, Abraham must learn to walk in the dark. And as the story tells us, Abraham often bumps into things along the way.
The Hebrew verb here (from halak) is quite specific. “You go for yourself!” God’s call to Abram is unique. It breaks the cultural expectations in much deeper ways than we think. To really understand that impact of this command, we must examine how God’s call is attached to the three things Abram must leave behind.
Abram is asked to leave his country, his relatives and his father’s house. We don’t think too much about this separation today, but in ancient Semitic culture, this was an incredible request. To leave country, relatives and the father’s house was to leave all sense of identity, protection, community, continuity, inheritance and destiny. In a tribal culture, this was the equivalent of voluntary excommunication. God essentially asks Abram to remove himself from every connection to his old life and to attach himself to full commitment to the voice of God. What’s even more astounding is that God does not even tell Abram where he is going. He only says, “Go forth”.
How many of us would have been able to respond to such a call? Wouldn’t we hear ourselves saying things like, “But God, at least tell me where we’re headed?” or “God, don’t you see how much more effective I can be right here where I have so many connections?” I can hear myself complaining, “Lord, I’ve worked so hard to build up what I have” or “How can this be God’s voice? He would never ask me to leave my family.” We have dozens of reasons why we would rather have a future that we can control and understand. But God doesn’t seem to work that way.
As we read about the story of Abram, we are impressed by two opposing behaviors. The first is how often Abram made disastrous choices to try managing his own destiny. That sounds a lot like me. The second is how slowly Abram learned to trust the sovereign election of the God who chose him. That gives me hope. Because Abram went forth, I serve the God who called him. Thanks to my spiritual father, Abram, I am one of the children of his tribe. I pray only that God will find me faithful so that some day others will say, “Because of his choices, I am also a child of the King”.
