Advent Day 8: Promise Through Abraham

Go from your land,
your relatives,
and your father’s house
to the land that I will show you.
I will make you into a great nation,
I will bless you,
I will make your name great,
and you will be a blessing.
I will bless those who bless you,
I will curse anyone who treats you with contempt,
and all the peoples on earth
will be blessed through you. Genesis 12:1-3 CSB

While working up to the coming of Jesus we have to talk about a pivotal person in the Old Testament: Abraham. You may say it’s kind of weird to be sticking to a lot of Old Testament Scripture when talking about the baby Jesus. I would say we don’t truly understand who Jesus is and why He came if we don’t have at least have some understanding of where the Biblical narrative has been and where it’s going. The Old Testament is extremely relevant to our lives. Although culturally we have our distances, we’re still human with the same issues for the most part. The Old Testament is still written for us, even today.

Abraham

Abraham (Abram at first, then God changes his name) was in a foreign land serving pagan gods (Joshua 24:2-3) when God called him. God shows up and tells him to go to the land that He will show him and then unconditionally gives a promise of blessing to Abraham. Abraham had not done anything to warrant that- this was God as the acting agent. God promises to make him and his offspring into a great nation and that he will have more offspring than stars in the sky (Genesis 15:5). The interesting thing is that up until that point, Abraham and Sarah had been barren and were very old. Yet God, alluding back to His original promise, would be the One to make this come about. From there on, through Abraham’s son Isaac, and then his son Jacob, most of the Old Testament is focused on following this lineage.

What’s this have to do with Jesus? 

The big question that Abraham would have had would have been, “how will the whole world be blessed when my wife and I can’t conceive?” God miraculously blesses Sarah and Abraham with Isaac. God then calls Abraham to sacrifice this son of promise in Genesis 22 (as seen in the last article). How could God do this? God promised him that He would bless all the world through Isaac! And then at the last second, God provides a lamb to sacrifice. This is extremely symbolic: God would provide a Lamb to sacrifice, in place of our rebellion against a holy God, and that blessing would come through Abraham’s lineage as God originally promised.

Genealogy

Folks hate genealogies in the Bible, but they reveal some key details. Matthew 1:1-16 traces the genealogy of Abraham and then through Isaac. Where does it lead? It leads to Jesus. Jesus is the promised offspring to come, to bless all the nations. He is the One to come that will be the sacrificial Lamb (John 1:29), in our place, to put us in right standing with a holy God. He is the One that will someday crush the head of the serpent (Genesis 3:15) as we saw in a prior advent study. We need this King, this is who we’ve been longing for.

-Austin