Read Genesis 12: 1-5; 1 John 3:1.

Have you ever sat on a sunny seat or wall, pointed your head skyward and just basked in the balmy warmth of the sun on your face? The naked strength of this heat is a metaphor that allows us to glimpse just a fraction of the fierce intensity of God’s love towards us.

Whatever benefit and blessing we feel from the sun’s warmth, it is just a minute fraction of the lavish loving-kindness constantly flowing earthwards from the sun’s Creator God. He loves and cares deeply for us. That is the truth. It is a truly awesome thing that we as individuals can know our Father God’s heart of love for us intimately and personally. But the story of the Bible, from the Garden of Eden right through to the end of Revelation, reveals that Father’s heart of love is not only towards individuals, but also to nations.

Abram tried to make it happen himself.

In Genesis 12 God called one nomadic man, Abram, to follow Him, which he did obediently and faithfully. God valued Abram’s humble heart to such an extent that He entered into a covenant relationship with him whereby He promised childless and rootless Abram multitudes of descendants with a homeland of their own.

Genesis 16 relates the story of how, by using Hagar, Abram tried to make it happen himself. The result of her pregnancy was Ishmael, the father of the Arabic peoples. After his birth God changed Abram’s name to Abraham, meaning ‘father of many’. In the face of Abraham’s apparent moral failure, we might have been tempted to walk away from the relationship, but Genesis 17 describes how God did not do that, instead He affirmed the covenant He had made.

In Genesis 18:10 an angelic visitor prophesied to Abraham that within a year his wife Sarah, who was way past child-bearing age, would give birth to her own son. She laughed at the prospect but true enough within the year Isaac (ironically meaning laughter) was born. Through Isaac’s descendants, the blood-line of the Hebraic people is traced. The remainder of the book of Genesis tells the story of how Abraham’s family grew from one family unit into a whole nation and how they came to be living in slavery to Pharaoh in Egypt.

Additional reading: Psalm 100:5; 106:1; 107:1; 118:1.

Genesis 17 describes how God did not do that, instead He affirmed the covenant He had made.

Prayer Time:

• Who initiated the covenant with Abram?
• What do you think the significance of this might be?

In the Hebrew texts of the additional reading, there is actually no word in any of the passages that is translated into English as ‘endures’. It simply says ‘God loves forever’. The word ‘endure’ has been inserted by translators.

• Can you think why they have done this?

Spend time meditating on God’s enduring Father-heart of love. Pour out your heart of thanksgiving to Him.

Other devotionals in this series can be accessed here.