In Abram we see the blessed promises that are connected with the call of God, and we shall learn how faith responds to the call. First, however, in this deeply instructive history, we are permitted to see how often the man of faith may be hindered for a time from answering to the call.
The Ties of Nature
From Stephen’s address, recorded in Acts 7, we learn that the call came to Abraham, “when he was in Mesopotamia, before he dwelt in Charran.” In answering to this call, he was hindered by the ties of nature. The call came to Abraham, but nature apparently can at times profess great zeal in answering the call, and even take the lead, for we read, “Terah took Abram ... and went forth from Ur of the Chaldees, to go into the land of Canaan.” Man in his natural state may attempt to tread the path of faith, and, at the start, do the right thing with the best of intentions. But in self-confidence nature always undertakes to do more than it has the power to accomplish. Thus it came to pass that while Terah left Ur “to go to the land of Canaan,” he never reached the land. Nature stopped halfway at Haran, and there he dwelt to the day of his death.
But what of Abraham, the man of God? For a time he allowed himself to be hindered from fully obeying the call of God. It was not simply that his father was with him; he allowed himself to be led by his father, as we read, “Terah took Abram.” The result was that he stopped short of the land to which he was called. So we read, in Stephen’s address, he came “out of the land of the Chaldeans, and dwelt in Charran: and from thence, when his father was dead, he removed him into this land.”
How many of us have been hindered for a time from taking the separate path, consistent with the call of God, by some beloved relative. The call reaches the believer; he acknowledges the truth, but delays to answer it because some near relative is not prepared for the outside place.
The soul clings to the hope that by waiting a little the relative will be brought to see the call, and then both can act together. Faith, however, cannot lift nature up to its own level, though, alas, nature can drag down and hinder the man of faith. Many pleas can be raised to excuse this halfway halt, but in reality it is putting the claims of nature above the call of God. Then, as in Abraham’s history, God may have to roll death into the family circle and remove the one that we allowed to hinder us in obeying God’s call. Thus it was not until his father was dead that Abraham fully answered to the call of God.
H. Smith