STEPPING INTO THE UNKNOWN

By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going. —Hebrews 11:8

One of the sacred starting points—or restarting points—in the story of God’s relationship with the people He had made is the story of the call of Abraham, the beginning of a special history that is much of the story of the Bible. If we have an overall familiarity with how the story goes from this point, it can be easy for us to skip ahead to the highlights, direction, and momentum that seem inevitable in hindsight. We may just assume the stories of Abraham’s descendants, the Exodus, the Israelite nation, the Psalms and prophets, the coming of Jesus, the new movements of God in the early church, and Jesus’ promises to return and make all things new. But this story begins with a much smaller focus—a single family and a specific day on which Abram and his household left their home and set out for somewhere God had called them, but they did not know where they were going. Imagine the uncertainty, the anxieties, and the fears this day brought. Imagine the last-minute packing without knowing what they might need and the sadness of saying goodbye to friends and everything that was familiar, all of which they would likely not see again. Then there were the dangers of travel, concerns about food and water and where they would find more, and fears about strangers they would encounter who might not be friendly to a traveling community of foreigners. No wonder this starting-out (he “obeyed and went”) was remembered centuries later as a demonstration of faith. All that came after resulted from this particular day, overcoming the fear and uncertainty of not knowing where they were going and choosing to follow the call and go.