06.4.4. Abram's Trials Through the Word of God

IV. -- ABRAM’S TRIALS THROUGH THE WORD OF GOD AND PRAYER

Genesis 15:1-21 BUT conflict, though it ends in triumph, produces weariness. After great efforts and great success the spirit of faith is often suddenly, and, as it thinks, unaccountably, depressed. A reaction is felt, when dryness succeeds to that life and energy which has carried us on hitherto. At such an hour our very blessings try us. That our trials are blessings has been already learnt. Now we learn that blessings are trials too. And though in measure the elect must have proved this before, -- for God’s call, and Sarah, and Lot, and the flocks and herds, all of which were blessings, had all been trials also, -- the lesson now is learnt in reference to a class of blessings from which till now we expected nothing but peace. God’s own promise and worship are found to try Abram more deeply perhaps than anything which had as yet befallen him.

First, the promise tries him. We read, "After these things the word of the Lord came unto Abram, in a vision, saying, Fear not, Abram, I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward. And Abram said, Lord God, what wilt thou give me, seeing I go childless?" (Genesis 15:1-2).

Now this answer expresses deep soul-trial, the time of which is specially noted -- "after these things." This is not faith’s first experience. When the word first calls us, though it costs us outward grief, the joy it gives, not to say the excitement it occasions, keeps us from dwelling on our want of fruit. The Lord has promised a land and a seed. On this we can leave our country and kindred, not knowing what the promise will cost us, or how much is to be endured before we obtain the fulfilment of it. We eat the words, and in our mouths they are sweet as honey: we know not that they may be bitter in the belly (Revelation 10:9). Even Terah, the old man, is stirred by the call, little knowing what its results may be. So we start with joy; but years on years pass away: mercies by the way are given, but we have as yet neither the promised fruit nor the inheritance. At last an hour comes when we have counted all things but dross and dung for Christ. The world has come, only to be rejected. Faith, bold to rely on God alone, will not take from it "even a shoe-latchet." At such a moment, the Lord speaks again. The old promise is heard. Still we are barren. And the soul, feeling that it is apparently as far from the fulfilment as when it first started, -- further, in one sense, for there was then some energy in the flesh, which the trials of the way and weary years have now well-nigh quenched, -- answers with something between a sigh and a prayer, saying, "Ah, Lord God, what wilt thou give me?" I have no seed, no fruit: as yet my only heir is this steward born in my house, this "Eliezer of Damascus." Shall he, this spirit of bondage, be the seed? Can this be the promised blessing? Surely there must be something better? So argues faith, even in its depression; and the Lord at once answers, that this steward, this spirit of bondage, is not the promised seed: "This shall not be thine heir; but he that shall come forth out of thine own bowels, he shall be thine heir" (Genesis 15:4). Precious words, but no less a trial to the spirit of faith, which against hope believes in hope. A "seed" and a "land" are still the hope which tries the believer. Fruit does not indeed at first much press or exercise us. We look forward to it, because God has named it; but other things surround and occupy us, and its absence for a while does not disquiet us. At such a stage we have enough to do with the old man who goes with us, or with Egyptians, or famine, or strifes with brethren, to think much of the promised fruit. It is far otherwise when the old man has been buried, and we are left alone; when all having been forsaken, and the tempting world denied, we yet are fruitless and strangers without our inheritance. Earnestly then the soul begins to long for that which God has promised it. Fain would it see "the seed," Christ formed within us. Hitherto Christ for us has been enough, the word of God pledged on our behalf. Now Christ in us is longed for daily, the image of God, the spirit of sonship, to live and grow in us. And God replies that such too is His will; that if we go without this, we lack what He has promised us. "He brought him forth abroad, and said, Look towards heaven, and tell the stars, if thou be able to number them. And he said, So shall thy seed be." "He brought him forth" out of his narrow tabernacle; faith is led beyond those limits which flesh and blood throw around it, into that expanse where the breath of heaven may touch it, and the countless lights of heaven shine on it, and in this freer air God Himself speaks again, saying to faith, "So shall thy seed be." (Note: Ambros. de Abr. l. ii. c. 8, § 48.) And although the words, "Lord, what wilt thou give me?" and, "Lord, whereby shall I know that I shall inherit it?" shew fear as well as faith, yet "Abram believed, and it was counted unto him for righteousness" (Genesis 15:6; Romans 4:3; Romans 4:6). So ends the trial through the word, while out of the trial faith reaps fresh blessing, even righteousness. Faith takes God to be God, and thus honours Him far more than by many works. And therefore God honours faith, "counting it for righteousness," more precious to Him than gold, yea, than much fine gold. Surely in a world where nearly all doubt God, the sight of a poor barren creature in utter helplessness resting on God’s promise must be a spectacle even to heavenly angels. Even the eyes of the Lord run to and fro through the whole earth, seeking it, and where He finds it, He makes Himself strong in behalf of it (2 Chronicles 16:9).

Faith, however, still must be tried; and the very worship to which the reception of the word now leads, though the door to fresh blessings, opens through fresh disquietudes. The steps are these: the soul believes that it shall be even as the Lord has promised; but though it believes, it does not understand how or through what experience the blessing is to come to it. In answer, therefore, to the promise, it says, "Whereby shall I know that I shall inherit it?" The Lord replies by a command to sacrifice, and in this worship and sacrifice His way is manifested (Genesis 15:9-18). Beside the altar light breaks in. Faith may be strong and grow while yet in outward things; but light comes, while we stand before the Lord, by the holy altar of burnt-offering. At every stage we prove this truth. Noah is taught much beside his offering (Genesis 8:20-22). So, too, is David in later days (Psalms 73:16-17). Abram no less by the altar learns the reasons for the delay in the possession of the inheritance. There is opened the experience of his seed: there again the covenant is renewed and added to. The seed, it is declared, shall be a stranger here, but in God’s time it shall come with great substance to its inheritance. To look for a moment at this worship; for the spirit of faith yet worships in no other way. "The Lord said, Take me a heifer, and a she-goat, and a ram, and a turtledove, and a young pigeon. And he took unto him all these, and divided them, but the birds divided he not." This was in substance Abel’s offering, the figure of the sacrifice of Christ, both for us, and in us; though at this stage we have far more detail and greater insight into particulars. Here all the forms, "bullock, goat, and turtle-dove," that is, service, sin-bearing, and innocence, if we take the outward view, -- inwardly, all those powers which must die in us, when in and through Christ we present our bodies a living sacrifice, -- are each discerned; the different parts too are marked; the head, and legs, and inwards, all being discriminated; that is, the thoughts, the walk, and the affections, no longer overlooked in the general thought of offering, now claim our notice as we give them to God, a willing sacrifice to His holiness. (Note: On this subject I have spoken at length in "The Law of the Offerings," pp. 77-83. See Lira’s comment on the text, in loco.) Faith will not offer less than these, and in thus offering it learns the Lord’s purpose. And to this day sacrifice is the key to the secrets of the Lord’s heart. Many a word tries us until the sacrifice for us and in us is apprehended. Then the word is understood; then the oath is heard; then the reasons, why our God acts as He does, open upon us. To how many low and doubting thoughts is the apprehension of Christ’s sacrifice for us an answer. To how many struggles is Christ’s sacrifice in us the one reply. We wonder we must wait for our inheritance. We wonder we must prove what flesh is; that it is barren, dead, worthless. The slain Lamb is seen; that life and death witness that to meet God the creature must first suffer; that we must die to have God’s life exhibited. If we have presented our bodies a living sacrifice, this truth will be yet more manifest. For the veil, (and "the veil is His flesh," -- that flesh in which He yet walks, for He hath said, "I will walk in them," Hebrews 10:20; 2 Corinthians 6:16,) when rent by the cross, opens to view the great mystery. Now we can see why we must suffer here: faith is almost turned to sight beside the sacrifice. And though even after such communion an hour may come when the soul again is faint because of the way, the remembrance and savour of such hours do not soon leave us: we go on in the strength of it many days.

Sweet, however, as are the ultimate results of such experience, the apprehension of the cross, in our intercourse with God, at the time costs us not a little. One distraction after another presses the spirit of faith, while it is occupied with the appointed sacrifice.

First, "the fowls come down on the carcasses" (Genesis 15:11). No sooner are the bodies of the beasts offered, and the parts laid open before the eye of God and the worshipper, than the fowls come down, to mar the offering if they can. So when the believer has set before him the sacrifice, and in the contemplation of it would fain learn to see and feel with God, the fowls, "evil spirits in heavenly places" (Ephesians 6:12), powers within or without subject to the wicked one, messengers of "the prince of the power of the air" (Ephesians 2:2), (Note: The "birds" stole away "the good seed." Our Lord explains this by, "Then cometh the devil, and catcheth away that which was sown in their hearts." Matthew 13:4; Matthew 13:19. Compare also Deuteronomy 28:26; Jeremiah 5:27; Revelation 18:2. Gregory the Great beautifully comments here, Moral. in Job, l. xvi. c. 42, § 53.) come to distract our communion, as far as may be. He that has stood beside his offering knows what distractions these winged messengers cause, while we rise up like Abram to "drive them away."

Then comes "darkness:" -- "when the sun went down, a deep sleep fell on Abram; and, lo, a horror of great darkness fell upon him" (Genesis 15:12). While on earth, our appointed life of faith is one of alternate light and darkness. We would watch while we are beside the altar, though such darkness cover the earth that our very spirit feels it. But it is hard to watch at such times, when nature sleeps. A horror of great darkness, however, is not overcome by slumbering. We must go through the trial with our God: in it we shall learn what purposes He has in trying us.

Here the hour of trial proves an hour of light; the darkness which shuts out the world does but reveal heavenly things. Abram learns through the darkness more of God’s will. Before this, he had the promise of a seed. Now he learns some details of the appointed cross, and that only "through much tribulation" the kingdom will be won. The "smoking furnace" is seen, ready to purge away the dross; but beside it appears the "burning lamp" (Isaiah 62:1). (Note: Ambros. de Abr. l. ii. c. 9, §§ 61, 62.)

Thus in light ends this trial. The spirit of faith, awaking to its own barrenness, not only with the heart believes unto righteousness, but receives in worship enlarged promises. It may yet err in its efforts to bear fruit, but henceforth there is no more anxious disquietude.