Why did God choose Abram?
"And Joshua said unto all the people, Thus saith the LORD God of Israel, Your fathers dwelt on the other side of the flood in old time, [even] Terah, the father of Abraham, and the father of Nachor: and they served other gods."
Joshua 24:2 KJV
Abram and his father Terah were steeped in the idolatry of Mesopotamia. Due to the longevity of life in those days, Nimrod would likely still have been alive and spreading the mother child cult throughout the known world. The name Ur actually meant fire and would suggest that form of worship which required human sacrifice. The offerings of infants into the fires of Molech pervaded Mesopotamia and the lands that Abraham and his seed were promised.
We know that Abram first encountered the living God while he was still in Mesopotamia (Acts 7:3,4). As a result of this encounter, he believed the promise that God would give him a land to dwell in.
Now there appeared to be a pattern to Abram’s character that is being revealed. According to Rabbi Forman based on the 'midrash' or ancient jewish commentaries, Abram choose Sarai for a wife even though tt was known that she was barren.
Yet when we compare this thought to Gen 18:11,12 it suggests that as a result of her old age “it ceased to be with Sarah after the manner of women.” (Menopause). A further observation that this is linked to her old age is that this is said of Sarah and not Sarai. Her name change occurred when she was ninety years old. (At the same time that God confirmed His promise to Abram, now Abraham, that he would be a father of many nations).
Nevertheless, it still may be possible that the end of her menses occurred many years earlier, perhaps even before she and Abram were married. If this were true, it would suggest something about Abram's character that he recognized his half sister's plight and so took it upon himself to marry her for her welfare and protection even if it meant being childless.
We see a similar evidence of Abraham's tendency to put others before himself. A time came for he and his nephew Lot to separate so that their herdsman would not quarrel over grazing land for their flocks. Abraham deferred to Lot to make the choice of land.
Given these hints of Abraham's disposition, it suggests that the pagan practices of human sacrifice may have become repulsive to him. It has also been suggested that the death of Abram's older brother Haran was not prevented and may have even been caused by the grotesque worship toward the Mesopotamian gods.
So Abram's encounter with the one true God showed Abram a continuing city free of human sacrifice and death (Hebrews 11: 8-10). This was a welcome respite from the suffering caused by human allegiance to these tyrannical gods.
We learn from Abram that the experience of faith is not compulsion but attraction. The Apostle Paul would later call this this turning to God from idols. Notice that such faith as his is not a turning from idols to God. This is compulsion or legalism.
Abram was not forced to turn from his idols, but he chose to turn to God whose power and compassion are far greater than worldly gods. He had been given a vision of Messiah’s day and rejoiced in the love of the Eternal Son (John 8:56)
Having believed God, it was counted to him for righteousness. (Genesis 15:6) This experience of receiving God's righteousness is what Peter calls ‘partaking of the divine nature’. (2 Peter 1:4) We learn that as a result of his faith Abram was given a glimpse of that Jerusalem which is free. (Galatians 4:26) This is the liberty of the Spirit in contrast to the bondage of religion.
One of my favorite writers of a past era is C.H. Mackintosh. He writes:Is our Salvation conditional or unconditional? What is the one requirement for salvation?
Just as Abram had to acknowledge that God alone is good, so do we have to move in faith “to God, from idols” Does this one requirement change an unconditional salvation? The reformed Christian community says that the Abrahamic Covenant is conditional because it requires acting in faith.
Rather than being attracted to God from idols, they contend that saving faith binds us to turn from idols to God. Rather than a persevering work of the Spirit of God to effect change in us, they hold that the perseverance of the saints is an outworking of faith by us. This shifts the responsibility of staying saved onto the Christian.
This was not Abram's experience. God's gifts and calling are without repentance. (Romans 11:29; i.e. God will not fail to keep His promises) It was not Abram's perseverance that accounted for God to pronounce Abram as righteous. Rather, it was God's promise to keep Abram and his descendants as heirs of the land where God has chosen to place His name.
"But now thus saith the LORD that created thee, O Jacob, and he that formed thee, O Israel, Fear not: for I have redeemed thee, I have called [thee] by thy name; thou [art] mine."
Just as Israel is secure as God’s special creation, so is the Christian secure as a new creature in Christ. Abram's faith did not start a new religion among mankind, he started a new relationship for mankind that bestows upon the believer a new nature of righteousness.
Again, C.H. Mackintosh elaborates:
"How different is all of this from the legalist’s notion! Instead of calling upon me to educate and manage, by the dogmas of systematic religion, an irremediably corrupt nature, in order that thereby I may surrender an earth that I love and attain to a heaven that I hate. He, in infinite grace and on the ground of Christ’s accomplished sacrifice, bestows upon me a nature which can enjoy heaven and…Himself the unfailing spring of all heaven’s joy.”
Abram's faith began a relationship with the one true God that promises blessing mankind with a new nature and restored earth through God's promised seed.
The challenge to each of us is to turn to God from idols. Is there a moment in your life that you have taken God at His Word and simply trusted in Jesus Christ for eternal life?
If not, it can happen right now...All that is required is that you turn to Him and trust Him to change you.
smc
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