And Joshua said to all the people, “Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, ‘Long ago, your fathers lived beyond the Euphrates, Terah, the father of Abraham and of Nahor; and they served other gods. 3 Then I took your father Abraham from beyond the River and led him through all the land of Canaan and made his offspring many. I gave him Isaac. – Joshua 24:2-3 ESV
Warrior;
In order to understand, to make sense of any story we don’t go to the end of the story, we go to the beginning of a story. If you came into a movie that was half way through and it was making sense- would you fast-forward to the end to make sense of it, or would you go to the beginning? When studying the Bible we don’t go to Bible prophecy and ‘end-times’ study to make things make sense, we go to the beginning of the story, to the Genesis! The word Genesis means, BEGINNING. The Father of the three great Faiths; Judaism, Islam and Christianity all have ABRAHAM as the FATHER of their faith. We first hear of Abraham in Genesis 11 and then God chooses him, to be the one who is blessed and then becomes a blessing to all who BELIEVE!
Leader, Pastor Robert Jeffers says that Genesis 1-11 could be called, “Mans Alienation from God” It is the introduction to HIS-story; History, the creation of the world, Satan is introduced, the fall of man, the flood and Noah’s ark, and it culminates with the Tower of Babel- which is mans ultimate defiance of His creator! God could of SMOTE men then, God was JUSTIFIED in condemning man to punishment! But God being ABUNDANT in Love, Mercy and Grace created a RESCUE PLAN. The rest of the Bible; Genesis 12- Revelation 22 could be called; God’s reconciliation with Man. And God started this process by choosing Abraham as the “point-man’ in His plan of RESTORATION for the entire world. Genesis 12:1-3 is the beginning of God’s plan using Abraham as the CONDUIT!
Conduit, why did God choose Abraham? His choosing of Abraham had nothing to do with Abraham, it had everything to do with God. As we see above, Abraham and his family where Idol worshipers in the land of UR; the center of idolatry at that time. God is not a respecter of persons, see Acts 10:34 and Romans 2:11. And Jesus said to him, “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone. (Mark 10:18) Whether the Old Testament, or NEW, people are only saved by GRACE! And Abram believed the LORD, and the LORD counted him as righteous because of his faith. (Gen 15:6) The Basis of salvation is God’s grace, not by our works. The means of salvation is CHRIST’s death. But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:8) The channel of SALVATION is our FAITH! We are not saved by FAITH, we are saved by GRACE. Through GRACE we are saved by FAITH! God could have picked anyone, He chose Abraham it is GOD who deserves ALL THE GLORY! He IS THE MINISTER of Reconciliation!
Way of The Warrior- A Daily Devotional 