In the story of Christianity, Abraham has a very special place. In Judaism he is called the ‘Father of the Nations’ because that is the title God gave to him. In Genesis 17, when Abraham was 99 years old, he made a covenant that Abraham would be the first of God’s chosen people. It is at this point that God changed his name – always something of great significance in the Bible – he would no longer be Abram as we heard him called in this morning’s Old Testament lesson, but Abraham, which means ‘Father of the Nations’ and it signifies a change in Abraham’s status.

Thus, he became God’s chosen instrument by which the long process of winning a people to God’s heart begins. In the Magnificat, Mary speaks of God’s promise of mercy:

The promise made to our ancestors,
To Abraham and his children for ever

Throughout the New Testament the claim is made that what God promised to Abraham was fulfilled in Jesus. Not surprisingly, therefore, he is held in the greatest esteem by the Christian Church. The Apostle Paul gives him a special place in the Christian story. In his letter to the Galatians he speaks of those who believe (in Christ) to be descendants of Abraham and points out that Scripture has foreseen the day when the Gentile, non-Jewish world would receive the message of salvation, the Good News of Jesus Christ. Paul says that God had declared the Gospel beforehand to Abraham when he said that in Abraham all the gentiles shall be blessed.

In part this is because the writers of the New Testament wanted to root the Christian faith into its Jewish ancestry and push forward the claim that it is in Jesus Christ that God fulfils his Old Testament promise – something, of course, the Jewish leaders rejected when they manipulated our Lord’s death, but it was more than simply proving something to the Jews. Paul wanted to show the new Christians that they had always been part of God’s plan of salvation.

Abraham’s place in God’s saving action in Jesus Christ has been recognised since New Testament times. In the  Church, Abraham is called “Our Father in faith” and in Eastern Orthodox Christianity where he is known as  the Righteous Forefather he is  regarded as a Saint, with his own feast day (October 9^th).

So what kind of man was he? This first chosen of God.  You will naturally assume that he was a towering spiritual giant because he was described by God as righteous.  Well, without doubt he was certainly that but before we get carried away with his undoubted holiness, let’s not forget he had one or two flaws.  First of all he was a liar.

He lied to Pharaoh in Egypt that his wife was his sister – a lie he repeated some time later to King Abimelech who decided that such a good-looking woman deserved his favours and, assuming her to be free, took her to himself. Thankfully God intervened before any harm could be done and Abraham’s ruse was exposed .

Secondly, Abraham and his barren wife Sarah were so desperate to have a child that they hatched a plot that he should  have sex with their servant, Hagar. With the result that she conceived and was eventually to give birth to Ishmael. Sarah was then jealous of Hagar and persuaded Abraham to send her  away. Again God intervenes  and brings Hagar back.

All went well until, by a miracle of God, Sarah herself conceived and bore Abraham the son he wanted – whom they names Isaac - a name meaning Laughter - because when God told the couple that they would have a son  they laughed in God’s face. (Perhaps not surprisingly because Sarah was 90 by this time and Abraham was a 100!)

After Isaac’s birth, Sarah became worried about possible prior claims to his rightful inheritance by Ishmael so she persuaded Abraham to send Hagar away again. Though he gave them food for the journey it could hardly be said that he took his responsibility to Ishmael seriously.

I will gloss over the most famous story concerning Abraham – that of his willingness to sacrifice Isaac.  It was after all,  a test of his faith that he passed with flying colours but one wonders what psychological damage he might have inflicted on poor Isaac as a result! I’m sure Social Services would have been most interested in his case. You can imagine the headlines – “Religious Leader attempts to burn his son on a bonfire!” The tabloids would have a field day!

So, then,  this is the man God called to be the Father of Nations and to play such a key role is establishing God’s covenant with the human race.  In many ways, it is rather comforting. We naturally assume that those whom God chooses to share his work are superhuman spiritual giants – models of shining holiness.

The truth is rather different. He chooses the flawed and the imperfect because, in truth, that’s all he’s got to work with.

A famous preacher once addressed some theological students – “Gentlemen” he said, “do not attempt a series of sermons on great characters of the Old Testament. Remember, Abraham was a liar, Moses a murderer, Jacob a thief and David an adulterer.”  And that’s before we get onto the disciples and St. Paul with all their flaws and foibles.  To these and, more significantly today, to us, he entrusts his work of saving humanity and loving them into His Kingdom. 

Well, I suppose God has only himself to blame. He made us.  Or more significantly – he re-makes us.  As he re-made Abraham.  For Abraham did indeed become a man whom God could use because, despite all his flaws, he was truly a man who put his faith and trust in God.

We heard this in today’s Old Testament Lesson  when God made promises to him and He believed the Lord.  What a wonderful and yet simple statement of faith that is.   He believed the Lord.  So what we begin to see – and it comes over time and time again in Abraham’s story – is just how much Abraham  TRUSTED God.  Whatever the flaws in his character – lack of faith in God is not one of them.

He might have failed to live up to God’s expectations from time to time but he never wavered in his belief that God was guiding his life and watching over him.  And he was rewarded because God made a covenant with him – a promise that he would begin the long process of leading God’s people to the promised land.  Here, our attention switches from Abraham to God himself because we are given a picture of how God takes our trust and returns it by showing how much he trusts us.

In the story it happened this way. Abraham prepared a sacrifice of assorted animals and then he falls into a deep, but troubled, sleep. The darkness of the night is matched by a darkness – deep and terrifying­ – within himself. And it is then that God acts. The picture of a smoking fire pot and flaming torch are both symbols for God himself. In the Old Testament God’s presence is often symbolically through flame – as, for example, the encounter which Moses had with the burning bush, out of which the voice of God speaks.

As God passes over the sacrifice Abraham has prepared He is doing something stupendous. He is making a binding promise to Abraham and through him to his descendants, including us, that he will be forever bound to us and be totally committed to our salvation. This is nothing less than the promise that He entwines His life with ours and will stop at nothing in loving us into His Kingdom.

For Abraham the covenant is about being led into the physical promised land from the rivers of Egypt to the river Euphrates but that is just the beginning.  The Promise is an eternal one and in that middle of the night passing over the sacrifice Abraham has prepared there is the promise of an even greater sacrifice by which God will bind the human heart to his heart. 

To understand just how far God intends to go we have to switch our attention to today’s Gospel.  Though the Pharisees tell Jesus to flee from Herod’s wrath, Jesus ignores them. He must press on to Jerusalem because only in Jerusalem can he suffer and die and that is what Jesus is expecting will happen.  There, as the Holy Week events unfold Jesus himself will be the Sacrifice which finally binds God to us in a final working out of his Covenant with humanity.  And in our Lord’s commitment to go to Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it  we see both elements of the Abraham story being worked out.  For it is Jesus who TRUSTS His Father and it is His Father who makes the Covenant.

In the sacrifice of Calvary the fire of God’s love passes over the Cross and reaches into our human hearts.  And what God is saying to us today, through all this, is that He is absolutely committed to us with a Love that will endure everything, literally everything, in order to claim us for His own.

The work God began in Abraham is completed in Jesus - in his sacrifice on Calvary – but much more than that – because of Calvary it can be completed in us.  And if you take any message into your heart this morning it is paramount that you begin to recognise just how far God is prepared to go to demonstrate His desire for You to enter His Kingdom.  And having begun to recognise that – to allow yourselves to be re-made so that your life becomes changed by that Promise of God’s love for you.

Of course, we are flawed. We are imperfect. We fail. We make mistakes. We don’t measure up to God’s expectations – as Abraham didn’t – but as long as we have faith and as long as we trust God – then none of that matters. He will do all that is necessary to re-make us in the image of His Love – and I can say that with absolute confidence  because He has already done it – in Jesus, on Calvary.

That is the true Covenant God makes with us – a Promise from which he cannot escape because He has bound himself to it – and to us – forever.  That’s the tremendous truth you can take from today’s Scripture – and the moment you start to believe it is the moment when your salvation is assured.