Genesis 13:14-18

Yahweh said to Abram, after Lot was separated from him, “Now, lift up your eyes, and look from the place where you are, northward and southward and eastward and westward, for all the land which you see, I will give to you, and to your offspring forever. I will make your offspring as the dust of the earth, so that if a man can number the dust of the earth, then your seed may also be numbered. Arise, walk through the land in its length and in its breadth; for I will give it to you.”

Abram moved his tent, and came and lived by the oaks of Mamre, which are in Hebron, and built an altar there to Yahweh.

It is encouraging to see how God repeats his promises to us. So often in life, we don’t have any indication that what God has promised is actually going to happen. In fact it often appears that things are not moving in the right direction. There are times when God reminds us of what the truth is even when we can’t see it yet. That is what hope is all about. God wants us to hope in what He has told us.

Here we read that God shows Abraham how many decedents he was later to have and how much land that they would occupy. It’s remarkable that Abraham really hadn’t done any amazing good deeds. In fact, he had done some questionable ones, but God promised to bless Abraham in an enormous way. God’s blessings are way too large for the amount of
good works that Abraham had done.

We learn in the New Testament that God blesses people who, even though they haven’t done good works, have had faith in what God said. It’s not that good works are not required by God, it’s just that no one does enough of them to deserve God’s blessings. In fact, we all deserve to die. God’s gifts to Abraham because of his faith, show us the right way to have a relationship with God. God wants to bless us through faith and He wants to give us far more than we can imagine.

We have much to be thankful for because of all that God has promised to us.