In our last teaching, we started looking at God’s plan to redeem man from
the satanic nature and the Covenants he made with man starting with the
Abrahamic Covenant.

The Covenant God made with Abraham is a very crucial Covenant in the
story of redemption so we are going to look at that Covenant in more
details today.

In Genesis 12:1-4
The Lord had said to Abram, “Leave your country, your people and your
father’s household and go to the land I will show you. 2 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. 3 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
left, as the Lord had told him…” (NIV)

God restated this promise in different ways through the book of Genesis.

In Genesis 22:18, He promised Abraham – “and through your offspring all
nations on earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed me.” (NIV)

So God appeared to a man who did not know Him at the time and gave him
a command which was also a promise to leave his country and father’s land
and move to a land which God would show him; and that He would bless
him; give him a land; make him a blessing to others; bless his descendants;
make him a great nation.

Now, certain things stand out in this Covenant.

• It was an unconditional Covenant in the sense that only God had a
  responsibility to act. Abram was not required to do anything. The
  fulfillment of the promises depended only on God’s faithfulness. The
  fact that the fulfillment depended solely on God is buttressed by the
  practice of cutting covenants in the ancient world. A Covenant was
  made official by cutting an animal into two and placing the flesh on
  the ground. Both parties involved in the Covenant would then walk
  through the pieces of animal. In the case of the Covenant that God
  made with Abraham, God passed between the pieces of flesh alone
  in the form of a smoking firepot and a blazing torch.
  God caused Abraham to fall asleep while this took place.

  So the full responsibility for the Covenant was on God. Abraham did not
  have to do anything. You can read this story in Genesis 15.

• The second remarkable aspect of this Covenant is that, Abraham,
  who was the son of an Idolater, who had never had any contact with
  God believed God and obeyed Him. Abraham believed that God
  would bless him; make him a great nation and deliver the world
  through his seed – meaning Jesus Christ.

What exactly do we mean when we say that Abraham believed God.
Abraham’s belief was not just a careless or mental assent to God’s
promise. He was actually certain; he was absolutely sure that God would
keep to His promise. Abraham was so certain that God would keep His that
he was ready to kill his only son Isaac at God’s command.

Let’s try to situate Abraham’s position. Assuming you have been given
prophesy that you would have two grandchildren. You have one son. And
when you are 60, another prophesy comes along that you should send your
only son to Sambisa forest to fight the Bandits and Boko Haram.
But Abraham was ready to obey God. According to Hebrews 11:17,
Abraham reasoned that if Isaac died, God was able to bring him back
to life again (NLT)

Abraham had so much faith in God that he believed that since God had
promised him that he would be a great nation through Isaac, then even if
he killed Isaac, God would bring Isaac back to life in order to fulfill His
promise!

This unqualified faith in Him by a previous worshipper of false gods excited
and thrilled God. Genesis 15:6 reports that –
“Abram believed the Lord, and he credited it to him as righteousness.” (NIV)

Because he believed God, God declared Abraham a righteous man; God
ignored his weaknesses and mistakes; God declared him free from
condemnation.
We can see this from Abraham’s dealing with the king Abimelech. He told
Sarah to tell the king that she was his sister and not to mention she was
also his wife. But who did God take His anger out on for this infraction?

The fulfillment of the Abrahamic Covenant depended solely on God’s
faithfulness and Abraham’s absolute belief in God’s promises. Abraham
was not required to do anything. The Abrahamic Covenant was not
performance based. The Abrahamic covenant was the beginning of God’s
Covenant of Grace that found its fulfillment in Jesus Christ.