Drawing Near to Godნიმუში

Day 4: Living by Unseen Realities

Read: Genesis 12-13

“I will make you into a great nation” (Gen. 12:2).

The whole question of why God chooses whom he chooses to do his Work in the world is a mystery. The Bible’s answer is, “so that no one may boast before him” (1 Cor. 1:29). The real story is about God, not his servants.

The personal and moral qualities one might look for in a man who was to be the father of millions, and through whom the peoples of Earth would be blessed, aren’t mentioned in his Call, because they are beside the point.

All God looked for in Abram was faith. Would he trust God’s Promise enough to leave what he had known, to travel to something he didn’t know, but that God would show him? Note: it was not something God had shown him, but what he would show him. Abram didn’t even get a map of where God was taking him; all he got was a Promise. His faith was a Call to live by unseen realities.

That is the worldview of Prayer. When we do something on our own, with what we can see, who gets the Glory? We do. When God answers prayer, in ways we can’t see, who gets the Glory? He does. That way no one can boast.

Mere human activity is about us. Prayer is about God. So wherever Abram went, this man of faith pitched tents and built altars (Gen. 12:7; 13:18). Tents are about the seen, what is ours; altars are about the unseen, what is God’s. Abram’s place of residence was a passing thing, his hope in the God he prayed to was fixed. If God’s people are often odd (cf. 1 Cor. 1:26-29), it’s only because his methods are too, from the world’s perspective. That way no one can boast.

To pray you must hope in God’s Good Promises more than you do in your own good ideas. When you do, you are taken places you never dreamed, for you hear God calling you to:

Leap out from your reedy shallows.

Dive into the moving water.

Eyeless, learn to see truly.

Find in my folly your true sanity.

- Luci Shaw, “The Foolishness of God,” from A Widening Light

PRAYER: God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and our Lord Jesus Christ: teach me to trust your Promises, that you may gain Great Glory, and I might know the Joy of communion with you.