The Lord had said to Abram, “Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you.

 “I will make you into a great nation,
    and I will bless you;
I will make your name great,
    and you will be a blessing.
 I will bless those who bless you,
    and whoever curses you I will curse;
and all peoples on earth
    will be blessed through you.”

So Abram went, as the Lord had told him; and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he set out from Harran. He took his wife Sarai, his nephew Lot, all the possessions they had accumulated and the people they had acquired in Harran, and they set out for the land of Canaan, and they arrived there.

Abram traveled through the land as far as the site of the great tree of Moreh at Shechem. At that time the Canaanites were in the land. The Lord appeared to Abram and said, “To your offspring I will give this land.” So he built an altar there to the Lord, who had appeared to him.

And so it begins! God’s great rescue plan for humanity. The flood didn’t wipe away evil forever. How could it? What’s needed is not a physically cleansed earth, but a spiritually cleansed earth. But that’s getting ahead of ourselves.

God chose Abram to be the Father of his people, to make him and his family line into a great nation to be a blessing for all the peoples on earth. Not just some of them. Not just the ones who looked right or had the right jobs or came from the right family, but all of them. Yes, God loves everyone in every nation and he desires they all be blessed.

When we lived in Ottawa, our church had a two year Bible study program called the Bethel BIble series. It was a two year walk through the whole Bible and it it took its motto from this passage, “Blessed to be a blessing.”

That’s what God did for Abram. That’s what he does for us today.

Abram was called to leave his family home and land and go to a new place God would show him to found a new nation that would bless the world. While you may not be called to something quite as grand, God still calls each of us today. As a follower of Christ you have been blessed through Abram. You have been blessed with eternal life, the indwelling of the Holy Spirit and every spiritual blessing in Christ. And as Abram was blessed to be a blessing, so have you. You aren’t blessed just for your own sake, but for the sake of others as well. God wants to bless everyone everywhere and just like he first chose to do it through Abram, he continues to choose to do it through people, including people just like you.

Let us pray.

Thank you God for your many blessings. It is astonishing to me that you would call me, that you would choose to work through me, that you would choose me to be a blessing to others. Help me to listen for your voice as Abram did so very long ago and may I be open and willing to go and do as you call me to go and do. In Jesus’ name I pray. Amen.

Questions

How have you been blessed by others? Give thanks to God for them and ask him to keep blessing them.

How have you been blessed by God? Give God thanks for the blessings you have received.

How is he calling you to be a blessing to others? If you aren’t sure, ask him.