In yesterday's passage the Lord comforted Abram by telling him not to be afraid. He also told him, "I am your very great reward."
Abram had turned down a great reward from the king of Sodom. He could have profited from rescuing Lot and the other captured citizens of Sodom, but he didn't want his name linked with the king of Sodom's. He didn't want anyone to think he and his men fought the five-king federation for monetary gain or that they won the battle because they were motivated by greed. They won the battle because the Lord was with them, not because they wanted a reward, so the Lord promised Abram that He Himself is going to be Abram's reward.
What does this mean? Certainly Abram is deserving of a reward for selflessly risking his life to rescue not only Lot, but the other citizens of Sodom and all their possessions. It was a courageous thing to do, being so sorely outnumbered. It was a faithful thing to do, for he trusted in the Lord to supply what he and his 318 soldiers lacked in numbers and in strength. The Lord is going to see to it that Abram gets a reward, but it won't be a temporary material blessing. It will be the fulfillment of the Lord's promise to make a great nation from Abram.
Abram has been living in fear that the five-king coalition will regroup and come after him. He has been experiencing a spiritual low because of this fear. When we get into a spiritual low, we have all sorts of negative thoughts, so Abram has probably been thinking about the material reward he turned down like this, "What difference does it make anyway? I'm already wealthy and I have no son to inherit anything I own. What good does it do me to keep amassing wealth when I have no one of my own flesh and blood to inherit it?" In this mood he asks the Lord a question. "But Abram said, 'Sovereign Lord, what can You give me since I remain childless and the one who will inherit my estate is Eliezer of Damascus?' And Abram said, 'You have given me no children; so a servant in my household will be my heir.'" (Genesis 15:2-3)
Is Abram throwing himself a little bit of a pity party here? I think maybe he is. But don't we all do this from time to time? The Lord blesses us in so many ways and yet sometimes we will focus on the thing the Lord hasn't yet given us. This is especially likely to happen if a particular thing is the greatest desire of our hearts. The greatest desire of Abram's heart is to have a child. He and Sarai are already past the age (or so he thinks) of naturally conceiving a child together. So in spite of all the Lord has already blessed him with, and in spite of all the ways the Lord has protected him and has promised to continue protecting him, Abram focuses on the one thing he doesn't have: a son. He supposes his heir will have to be the most trusted servant of his household.
I tend to think that at one time he might have planned to make his nephew Lot his heir, but now Lot is as wealthy if not wealthier than Abram. Lot doesn't need an inheritance. In addition to that, the Bible only mentions Lot having daughters. If Abram left his wealth to Lot, it would not continue down their male bloodline but would instead be inherited by the daughters which meant their husbands would own the inheritance, not them. This would cause the inheritance to pass down the bloodlines of other men and to belong to people of another name. The best Abram thinks he can do is leave his estate to a servant born in his own household. I don't know whether Abram had a last name, but in times past it was common for a servant or a slave to carry the same last name as his master. Abram may have thought this was the only way he could pass along his estate to someone who bears his name.
The Lord previously promised to make a great nation of Abram, but I think maybe Abram didn't understand that the Lord intends to do this through a son who is Abram's own flesh and blood. Maybe Abram thinks God intends to do this through a legal heir, like Eliezer the servant. In today's passage the Lord makes His intentions very clear, so clear that Abram can't misunderstand. "Then the word of the Lord came to him: 'This man will not be your heir, but a son who is your own flesh and blood will be your heir.' He took him outside and said, 'Look up at the sky and count the stars---if indeed you can count them.' Then He said to him, 'So shall your offspring be.'" (Genesis 15:4-5)
Is there anything more precious than when the word of the Lord comes to us? I can't think of anything in my life that's been more comforting or more awe-inspiring than when the Lord speaks to me. Sometimes He does it by communing with my spirit through the Holy Spirit. Other times He speaks through the Scriptures by the Holy Spirit. He has promised me things through the Spirit from time to time, and I've been so convinced of what He's saying to me and so overwhelmed with joy and assurance that I almost literally started jumping up and down. I remember one time when my mother had a great need in her life and it was something only the Lord could fix. I was walking in my back yard and out of the blue the word of the Lord came to me. In my spirit I felt Him saying to me that He was about to put things together in such a way that the whole problem would be solved. I knew what He was saying to me as well as I knew my own name in that moment. I knew it as well as I knew anything at all. I had no idea how the Lord was going to work this thing out because from a human standpoint it looked extremely difficult if not impossible for all the things to come together the way they needed to, but that same day I received a phone call from someone who had good news to tell me, and it just so happened that their good news was going to affect my mother. The great thing the Lord had done in their life was going to solve the problem my mother had. I could go on and on telling you about different times when the word of the Lord came to me, but this is just one example of what I think happened to Abram when the Lord spoke to him. I think Abram knew in his spirit what the Lord was telling him. He knew it as well as he knew anything else right at that moment. Because he knew it, he accepted what the Lord said on faith.
"Abram believed the Lord, and He credited it to him as righteousness." (Genesis 15:6) Did the Lord speak to Abram because Abram was a perfect and righteous man? No, we've already seen that Abram isn't perfect and that he doesn't always do the right thing. Here in Chapter 15 he's been wallowing in fear and doubt and self-pity. Earlier in Genesis we found him telling a huge lie about his wife---a lie that almost caused him to lose his wife to another man. But the Lord, in His love and mercy, chose to speak to Abram anyway. The Lord hasn't spoken to me because I'm perfect and righteous either. If I had to write out a list of all the mistakes I've made in my life, I'd be ashamed to ever come to this blog again. I wouldn't be able to show my face anywhere. It's only the Lord's mercy and grace that have caused Him to do anything for me at all; it's not because I deserve it. So don't start thinking the Lord isn't going to ever speak to you again or that He won't pull off some astonishing miracles in your circumstances. If help from the Lord depended on us being deserving of it, we'd be completely hopeless. We can never be righteous enough through our own efforts to deserve anything from a holy God. But the Lord mercifully credits righteousness to us because we believe in Him.
This is why the Lord counted Abram as righteous. It wasn't Abram's deeds that caused the Lord to credit him with righteousness; it was his faith. Abram believed the word the Lord spoke to him. Because he believed the Lord, the Lord considered him righteous. That's what salvation is. We believe on the Lord Jesus Christ (the One who is righteous) and because of our faith God credits us with righteousness. God covers us with the righteousness of His Son. We have no righteousness of our own. We needed someone else to do what we could not do for ourselves. The Lord Jesus did that! And because He did, and because we believe in Him, we share in His righteousness. Because of our faith, we will someday stand before a holy God and Judge and be declared "not guilty".
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