Terah took his son Abram and moved away from Ur of the Chaldeans.
He was headed for the land of Canaan, but they stopped at Haran and settled there.
Sometimes the journey gets interrupted.
Later the Lord said to Abram,
"Leave your native country, your relatives, and your father’s family,
and go to the land that I will show you."
This was a huge step for him to take...
heading out he knew not where.
The Lord appeared to Abram and said, "I will give this land to your descendants."
And Abram built an altar there.
Abram traveled south and set up camp near Bethel.
There he built another altar.
The importance of worship and of acknowledging what the Lord has done.
Abram continued traveling south by stages.
Note...he journeyed in stages.
We don't get to the final destination all at once!
Because of a severe famine, Abram went to Egypt where he lied to Pharoah
and was subsequently sent packing.
They continued traveling by stages toward Bethel,
where they had camped before.
where he had first built an altar.
There Abram called on the name of the Lord.
Sometimes we have to go back in order to go forward.
After mediating an argument between his herdsmen and his nephew's,
Abraham was off again on the journey.
The Lord said to Abram, "Look as far as you can see in every direction—
north and south, east and west.
I am giving all this land, as far as you can see, to you and your descendants
as a permanent possession.
And I will give you so many descendants that, like the dust of the earth,
they cannot be counted!
Go and walk through the land in every direction, for I am giving it to you."
So Abram moved his camp to Hebron.
There he built another altar to the Lord.
Another altar.
What happens at an altar?
Sacrifice.
Sacrifice to our plans, hopes, dreams, agendas, human reasoning.
Sacrifice and death so that life may spring forth.
Life, i.e. God's plans done in God's way and in God's perfect timing.