Since it Costs Alot to Win & Even More To Lose...

you and me bound to spend some time, wondering what to choose...
from "Deal" by Garcia/Hunter

this morning's reading from Gn12 has abram (soon to be abraham) hearing from the LORD that he is to go to a far off land, leaving all that he knows behind...country & culture, friends & family. all because of a promise. that takes faith & abram was obedient to God's voice and with just a few things (well, a little more than just a few things) off he went for canaan.

now, you would think that if God told him to go to a certain place, it would be a good place... a nice place...a place better than the one he was leaving, right? but it wasn't, exactly, that. it had potential, but it wasn't so good right then.

there was a famine in the land. trouble. abram stopped...stayed a bit...and built an altar to the LORD...he worshipped, & i wonder what the content of that worship was. he built that altar between Bethel and Ai...between "the house of God (Beth-house, El-God)" and "ruin (Ai= ruin)". between our way and God's way.

unspoken in the narrative is abram's need to make a choice...abide in the place where God has led him, or go off in his own direction finding his own way. & that is a hard choice to make some times... "why would God lead me here? He must expect me to find my way out, right?"

well what did tell abram? "go to the land i will show you" & when he got there, "i will give this land to your descendants". no change of plan necessary.

but--because he is afraid of the famine--abram goes down to egypt and begins a cycle of compromise... eventually he even puts his wife at risk by claiming she was only his sister.

there it started, between Bethel and Ai...between the house of God and ruin...between God's way and our way.

read about abram's 2nd choice tmw (Gn 13:1-14:24; Ps 4:4-8; Pr 2:1-5; Mt 6:1-18)