Genesis 12:1-9
The Call of Abram
1 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.
2 "I will make you into a great nation
and I will bless you;
I will make your name great,
and you will be a blessing.
3 I will bless those who bless you,
and whoever curses you I will curse;
and all peoples on earth
will be blessed through you."
4 So Abram left, as the LORD had told him; and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he set out from Haran. 5 He took his wife Sarai, his nephew Lot, all the possessions they had accumulated and the people they had acquired in Haran, and they set out for the land of Canaan, and they arrived there.
6 Abram traveled through the land as far as the site of the great tree of Moreh at Shechem. At that time the Canaanites were in the land. 7 The LORD appeared to Abram and said, "To your offspring I will give this land." So he built an altar there to the LORD, who had appeared to him.
8 From there he went on toward the hills east of Bethel and pitched his tent, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east. There he built an altar to the LORD and called on the name of the LORD. 9 Then Abram set out and continued toward the Negev.
God singles out Abram to take His name to the people...The LORD said to Abram leave your country, leave your people, and your father's household and go to the land I will show you...Then God gives Abram a promise to make him into a great nation...God would make his name great...God would bless him, and curse those who would curse him, and all the peoples on earth will be blessed though him...
Abram does God will...Abram did leave Haran and travel to the Promised Land, the land of Canaan, like God had told him...Lot, his nephew, went with him, as well as his wife Sarai...Abram was seventy five years when he left Haran...Abram took all his possessions they had accumulated and the people they had acquired in Haran, and set out for the land of Canaan...They arrived in the Promised Land...Abram traveled through Canaan as far as the great tree of Moreh at Shechem...At this time the Canaanites were in this land...The Canaanites were descendants of Canaan...Canaan was the son of Ham, and the grandson of Noah...
The LORD appeared to Abram, while he was in Canaan, and said to your offspring, I will give this land...Abram built an altar for our LORD, here in Shechem...From there he went on to the hills of east of Bethel and pitched his tent, with Bethel on the west, and Ai on the east...There near Bethel and Ai, Abram built another altar for the LORD and called on the name of the LORD...Then Abram set out for the Negev, a region south and a little west of Canaan...
Abram is our first Patriarch...This is our first geography lesson on the Promised Land, the land of Canaan, which later would be called Israel (to be named after Abram's grandson Jacob, whose name God would change to Israel)...Abram followed God's will...Abram was willing to leave all he knew and follow God...
We do not know how God spoke to Abram...God speaks to us in mysterious ways...God has a plan to show the world starting with Abram that man had fallen when Adam sinned...Man continued on its sinning way until He sent the Great Flood, during Noah's time, to wipe out mankind, the animals, and the creatures of the earth...Then, after the flood, only Noah and his family remained on earth...Abram was a great-great-great-great grandson of Noah's son Shem...Abram would be one of God's chosen instrument to carry His name and to teach the world about the LORD...Many, if not most, of the Canaanites worshipped false gods...Abram would build two altars in Canaan to praise God and to show the Canaanites and the people there that there is One True God...God would use Abram to express His heart to the world...
God's plan is not a short term plan...It is a plan that takes thousand of years to unfold...All the people on earth would be blessed through Abram...Abram was one of the first parts of God's plan...Abram's son Isaac, and grandson Jacob, and all future grandsons would be blessed through him...Abram is later called Abraham by God...Before Abraham existed, I AM -Jesus teaches us (John 8:58)...Jesus tells us (after being told that blessed is His mother who nursed Him) that even more blessed are all who hear the word of God and put it into practice (Luke 11:27-28)...Abram did just this...Jesus is our greatest blessing...God thousand of years later and after Abram, would send Jesus to fulfill His plan and redeem the whole world with His death dying on the cross...