Genesis 12:1  Now the LORD had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father’s house, unto a land that I will shew thee:
2  And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing:
3  And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed.

I was not alive during World War II. I have read of some of the treatment of the Jews during that time. I have also read of how nations such as Britain treated the Jews at that time. Britain used to be know as Great Britain. It was known as such because it had many colonies under its control. Today it is referred to as the United Kingdom (UK). The news shows us that it is not a very united kingdom at all. It is also not a great nation. Islam has gained a strong foothold in that country and it is now illegal to speak the truth against that vile ideology.
Recently I saw a report of the number of universities in the U.S. that are being investigated for their antisemitic activities. During the past four years of U.S. history, there was an open door of expression against the Jews. The government publicly would state that they were friends of Israel, but they did little to defend Jews in the United States from being targeted by Jew haters. Even the leader of the Democrats in the U.S. senate, who is a Jew, speaks out against his own people.
In Canada it is acceptable to stop traffic in major cities like Toronto to hold a protest against the Jews. It is acceptable to publicly express hatred for the Jewish people and to demand an end to the Jewish nation in their own land.
In our text, we are reminded that God chose to build a nation that did not exist prior to that time. He chose to take one man, named Abram to build this nation. Of course this man had a wife, named Sarai. The Bible teaches a patriarchal system, and God addresses men as the leaders. Women are also important and should never be treated as slaves. There are many so-called feminists who claim to be fighting for equal rights for women. Yet many of these have no problem with the sodomite agenda which is pushing a “transgender” ideology. Thus their superficial protests for equality are not genuine.
If we want to strike a proper balance on anything, we need to take God’s Word as our Authority, and we need to know the true God as our Authority.
God chose Abram and He commanded him to leave his homeland of Ur and go to a new land that He would show him. The land that God was going to take Abram to already had people living in it. God intended for man to fill the earth with people.
In Genesis 11 God deliberately scattered the people. He did not want the people to huddle in one area. He knew the nature of lost mankind, and we see that demonstrated in Genesis 11. God’s design for man is for man to live under His authority. Fallen man does not want to do that. God has given us His Word as our instruction manual. We know that many people fail to read instructions when they buy a new product. They try to figure it out for themselves. They will also modify the instructions because they might see a better way of getting that product to do what they want of it. That can often be true when it comes to man-made products.
However, no one can improve on what God has created and declared. God chose Abram to be the beginning of a lifelong object lesson of how things should be. We read in Genesis 15:16 that Abram and his descendants would not immediately officially take over the land that God guided Abram to. The Amorites were the current occupants of that land and God was not done dealing with them yet at that time. God would give them another four hundred and thirty years prior to Abram’s descendants moving in and taking over.
God often reminds us that the earth is His. He can move a people out and He can destroy an entire people. He never does so without reason. The Amorites were an ungodly people. They had the same opportunity of knowing the true God as all other people, but they chose to reject Him. They built their own religion and they grew into a large nation. God is in charge and He decided when the time of the Amorites was over.
God showed Abram/Abraham the land that He would give to his descendants. Abraham ‘sojourned’ in that land and both he had Sarah died and were buried in that land. Isaac lived in that land as well and Jacob grew up there and then lived in Ur for a number of years and then came back to the land of Canaan for a time. God moved them to Egypt for four hundred years.
It is a futile effort to fight against God. The land of Israel belongs to God and He gave it to the people of Israel. He gave it to the Jews. We are witnessing a growing hatred for the Jews and that hatred is rooted in a hatred of God. This hatred is affecting the world population as anti-semites attack Jews and Jews seek to protect themselves. Caught up in this turmoil are born again Christians. Jesus warned of the hatred that would exist against those who are born again Christians.
Those who know the Lord need to continue to pray for the Jewish nation. Many Jews hate God as well. They have rejected the blessing they could know in submitting to the true God. They might not want to be God’s object lesson to society in general, but they still are. God has continued to demonstrate His authority over mankind in His protection of the Jews over the centuries. It is no doubt frustrating to the God haters, that they cannot wipe out the Jews. It must also be frustrating to them that they cannot wipe out true Christianity. I believe there are more Jews in the world than there are true born again Christians. Those who are God’s people are privileged to be able to remind others of the importance of knowing the true God. God desires to bless man. He chose to use one man and one woman to further His plan of bringing His blessing on all mankind through the coming of His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.
The Lord Jesus Christ took upon Himself flesh. He took upon Him the flesh of a Jew. The Muslims are looking for their Imam. They will meet the devil face to face one day and they will not like it. They will spend eternity with him in the lake of fire. Many Jews are looking for their Messiah outside of the will of God. They too will find him one day and they will spend eternity in the lake of fire with him.
Those who have the faith of Abraham, are few. We look for the Messiah to return. We will rejoice in that day. We can also rejoice in this day as we live it for the true God. We can live in the blessing of God that was promised to Abram in Genesis 12. That is the only life worth living.
Abram needed to submit to God to know His blessing in his day. The same is true for us today. We need to submit to God to know His blessing. Let us choose to bless the nation of Israel today and receive the blessing of God in our hearts.
Pastor Bartel