Summary
Our created world undefiled by sin reflects the completeness and fulfillment of God’s goodness and should naturally find its rest inside God. Our worldly tendency to sin undermines God’s intention for man to live as a family with God and with one another inside of Him. Our sinful behaviors commence the slow erosion of family life by undermining the trust among intimates, the solidarity among brothers and the integrity of a bloodline established to preserve righteous exemplary behavior for future generations.
To combat the negative impact of sin on family life, God offers a covenant to Abraham to set aside a portion of mankind who will learn to be ordered, will learn to trust in God as the source of life, to be open in the way that God is open, and to be at home in no other location than that specified by God. The circumcision ritual is initiated here to physically mark Abraham and all of his descendants as participants in the covenant. The Abrahamic covenant therefore consists of three promises: a promised land (Abraham is commanded to leave Ur for Canaan, which will be renamed Israel), a promise of blood descendants (God increases Abraham’s numbers on a “nations” scale), and a promise of blessing and redemption for Abraham and his marked descendants.
In ancient Middle Eastern society, hospitality towards guests (practiced to an extent which appears to our modern eyes as extreme) was an extension of God-affirmed family life. In the sad tale of the city of Sodom, Lot extends hospitality to a pair of handsome angels that appear at the city gate while traveling. All the male inhabitants of Sodom surround Lot’s house, forming a frenzied mob intent on gang-raping the two attractive newcomers. Lot offers the mob his two virgin daughters, whom they reject while again demanding the newcomers. The entire city is thus implicated in a rebellion against God’s affirmed family life practice of hospitality to guests. . Sodom will later be left a smoking ruin by the outward expression of God’s wrath against the Sodomites carelessly burning away their own God-like resemblance in favor of unrestrained human lust.
Sin continues to progress among all the people on earth (even after the covenant with Noah!), unifying them in both language and technical achievements, in an attempt to claim heaven without the imprimatur of God’s grace. They do this with the intention of “making a name” for themselves, a pitiful assertion of hubris to claim salvation and reward in heaven without God’s judgement. God descends and takes account of this unjustified project, then scatters them and renders their language unintelligible, causing disunity and the inability to form family life. Sara and Abram (Sarah and Abraham before they migrate to the promised land) are also afflicted with the barrenness (inability to conceive) that God has imposed on mankind. Only God’s intervention can relieve Sara’s barrenness, and insure that their family building project in the promised land can proceed. Whether our sins take the form of dishonest accounting to God for a breach of His command, or disobedience driven by strong attachment to worldly things, faithlessness results in a turning away from seeking redemption from God. We ultimately damage ourselves in this way.
Bible Study Notes