Genesis: The Story of God's FaithfulnessShembull

SET APART

Listen to the audio guide to hear the complete devotional with Scripture, teaching and a worship song! Find a condensed, written version of this devotional below: 

A relationship with God is not just one part of our lives. Rather, a relationship with God transforms our entire life! This idea of a life of complete transformation is what we see God calling Abram to in the passage we just read. 

God asks Abraham to express his commitment to their covenant by circumcising every male in his family. Circumcision in this time and culture was commonly practiced as an initiation rite for priests. So, with this preconceived understanding, Abraham would have understood this practice as signifying that he and his offspring were going to be a priestly, holy nation, set apart from others. 

Abraham’s descendants were to be a community defined by their relationship with God. As recipients of God’s love and blessings, they were to live transformed lives that would point others to God! Their work, their relationships, their morals and values; these things were all to be transformed by their covenant relationship with God. 

Today, God does not ask his people to practice the sign of circumcision because Christians are not a physically set apart nation like Abraham’s physical descendants were. However, as part of the covenant community, believers today have a circumcised heart, or a heart that is committed to and set apart for God. 

Every part of our lives is affected by our relationship with Christ: 

• Our jobs are not for the purpose of self-fulfillment but for God’s glory. 
• Our finances are viewed not through the lens of self-gratification but through the lens of God’s values. 
• Our relationships become about pointing others to Jesus rather than pointing them to ourselves. 

God’s commitment to Abraham and his descendants resulted in a community set-apart and defined by their relationship with him. In the same way, God’s commitment to believers today through the work of Christ and the Holy Spirit results in a community of Christians defined by their faith. Every part of our lives becomes transformed by the love of God. 

REFLECT: Think about what it would look like for more of your life to be transformed by your relationship with God. What specific areas come to mind? Pray and ask God to help you commit these areas to him.