Friday, August 1, 2025  

Today's Scripture
Genesis 12:1–7

Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”

So Abram went, as the Lord had told him, and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran. Abram took his wife Sarai and his brother’s son Lot and all the possessions that they had gathered and the persons whom they had acquired in Haran, and they set forth to go to the land of Canaan. When they had come to the land of Canaan, Abram passed through the land to the place at Shechem, to the oak of Moreh. At that time the Canaanites were in the land. Then the Lord appeared to Abram and said, “To your offspring I will give this land.” So he built there an altar to the Lord, who had appeared to him. (NRSVUE)

Reflection

It’s so rewarding to know our roots. The German surname Schellhardt dates back to the late fifteenth century. A notable early bearer was Georg Schellhardt, a sixteenth-century Lutheran theologian and author on Protestant doctrine. God brought my Schellhardt ancestors to the U.S. in the mid-1800s. 

Today’s passage relates to the move of Abram (later Abraham, one of the most significant figures in scripture) to Canaan as directed by God, who promised to build his family into a great nation there. Without hesitation, Abram took his household and possessions with him as he assumed a covenant relationship with God. And God’s promise, aided by Abram’s son and grandson and their families, ultimately became the nation of Israel. 

This story serves as the foundation for so much of what we read in Genesis and, frankly, throughout the Bible. It underscores the blessings that obedience to God conveys and the clear biblical message that those who follow God do so in faith. 

Would you or I have instantly obeyed a similar order to leave a life we knew on a mere promise of a lofty future? Such a decision entails determining the depth of our own faith — and recognizing that Abram’s faith in God and God’s promises secured many subsequent blessings. 

Dutch writer and Christian Corrie ten Boom, who hid and rescued Jews from the Nazis, articulated the message beautifully: “Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God.” The hymn “The God of Abram Praise,” sung here by the London Philharmonic Choir, also conveys this passage’s powerful meaning. 

Prayer

God of covenant, show us how to honor Abram’s compact with you so we, too, may be a blessing to others. In Jesus’ name. Amen. 

Written by Tim Schellhardt, Member of Fourth Presbyterian Church

Reflection and Prayer © Fourth Presbyterian Church

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