Background:

Today is an exciting and highly emotional day for my wife and I.  It is filled with wonderful memories of the past and pleasant expectations for our future.  You see, we are in the process of moving away from our home of twenty-seven years.

We love our home, the neighborhood, our friends and neighbors, and especially our church where we have faithfully served for half a century.   We designed our home for the two of us with the help of an architect such that it would perfectly fit our lifestyle for many years to come as we grew older.  We carefully planned the landscape to complement the heavily wooded lot and leave it as natural as possible.  We spent years planting and tending to all the hundreds of different flowers and shrubs that make up what we call our “Shade Garden.”  Our home and Shade Garden is our personal sanctuary.

Our church friends have been a joy … supportive, encouraging and caring … fun to be with … prayer partners in times of distress and heartache … teachers, living examples, accountability partners … believers in truth, doing what is right, treating one another with love, compassion and respect.  Together we have witnessed hundreds, perhaps thousands, of people turn their lives over to Christ and many yield their future lives to full-time ministry as pastors, youth-ministers, missionaries, denominational leaders and even seminary professors.

Making the decision to leave the comfort and safety of our beloved home and church has not been easy.  It has taken many years of praying and continuous prodding by the Lord.   As we prayed we asked God to show us His will and provide His timing for our move.  We also prayed for the faith and strength to accept His will.    When we finally turned everything over to God we received His assurance that He is in control and would provide for our every need.

We are excited about what God is doing in our lives and are firmly convinced we are in The Lord’s will.

Moving On is always difficult when you are content with your current circumstances.  But staying in your comfort zone may not be what God wants for you.  Consider the example of Abram, likely content in his current situation, but willing to listen and follow Jehovah God’s bidding to leave his home In Accordance With God’s Will.

Scripture: (all ESV unless otherwise noted)

Genesis 12:1-7 – Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. ² And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. ³ I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” ⁴ So Abram went, as the Lord had told him, and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran.  ⁵ And Abram took Sarai his wife, and Lot his brother’s son, and all their possessions that they had gathered, and the people that they had acquired in Haran, and they set out to go to the land of Canaan. When they came to the land of Canaan, ⁶ Abram passed through the land to the place at Shechem, to the oak of Moreh. At that time the Canaanites were in the land. ⁷ Then the Lord appeared to Abram and said, “To your offspring I will give this land.” So he built there an altar to the Lord, who had appeared to him. 

Discussion:

By any standard Abraham (Abram) was an old man … seventy-five years of age.  Yet God chose Abraham for an important mission.  God literally spoke to Abraham revealing His will for his life.  God’s audible words were direct and to the point: “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you.”  God had a specific plan in mind for Abraham and his family.  He told Abraham to “Go“.  It was time for Abraham to Move On, regardless of his comfortable surroundings and circumstances.

Abraham listened and responded to God’s command … doing as he was told.  Abraham gathered his family and set off on God’s mission.  The way ahead would not be easy.  At times it would not be immediately clear to him that God’s purpose was being accomplished.  Yet he remained faithful and continued his journey under the leadership of the Lord.

Through Abraham God would “make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing.”  God’s blessings would be abundant.  God would use the Abraham and his descendents to build a great nation, a nation of people who would bring glory to Him … a nation that would ultimately be a blessing to the rest of the world and point them toward Him.

God speaks to us today in multiple ways, most particularly through His written word recorded in the Bible.  We don’t always have to know in advance the means by which God plans to accomplish His will and purpose through us.  Abraham did not know in advance, yet followed God faithfully.