Entertaining Angels Unawares

These last two Sundays, we've seen plenty unfolding in Genesis 17. Abram and his wife Sarai, now Abraham and Sarah, were both and each showered with new promises of blessing. Not only would Abraham become a great nation, but he and his wife would together make a plurality of nations; not only would they have seed, but that seed would include kings, effectively making Abraham and Sarah a king and queen in advance; and their royal seed would have the God of everything as their patron deity for all time. All they needed to do, to uphold their end of this covenantal bargain, was for Abraham to circumcise himself and the rest of the house's men; this mark in their flesh might mark them off from other households, giving them something new in common.

Now, it's fair to imagine that all that Genesis 17 stuff might go to Abraham's head. If he's going to make nations and kings, if his plentiful future offspring will have a mighty God all their own – well, how many of Abraham's neighbors can say the same? He's exalted in status beyond his peers on many fronts. That he's marked in the flesh may give him and his house a sense of togetherness that could cultivate an us-versus-them mentality, and it stands to reason that circumcision could incline them to be mistrustful of outsiders, standoffish to strangers, fearful of foreigners. The risks of Genesis 17 are prideful boasting and exclusive self-love. Or... or Abraham might take the last chapter in stride, conquering such temptations by the armaments of faith. He may remember that his blessings are so he can be a blessing – that his circumcision is a humbling of his flesh, not a grounds for boasting; that his destiny of nations and kings are so he can guide the world for the sake of the world. So the question that lingers as we leave the last chapter is: Which way will Abraham take things?¹

We hope for an answer because this new chapter 18 flows so fluidly from what came before it that Abraham's name doesn't appear until verse 6 – until then, he's just 'him,' because this is a continuation, not a new unit.² Abraham might still be recovering from his circumcision,³ or he might have healed up if it's been a couple months but no more.⁴ We open again “by the oaks of Mamre” (Genesis 18:1), “which are at Hebron” (Genesis 13:18). As nomadic livestock breeders, Abraham's family wouldn't be there year-round, but only during the warmer season; this in late June or early July.⁵ We're told the action opens “in the heat of the day” (Genesis 18:1), around noon or early afternoon.⁶ If modern conditions are any clue, the average daily high would've been in the 80s, but it could easily reach the upper 90s.⁷ In any sane culture that lives in such conditions, the 'heat of the day' is downtime. So noon doesn't find Abraham digging ditches or chopping wood; it finds him sitting down. This is siesta time. He sits at the entrance to his tent because, since Mamre is about half a mile higher than we are now, there should be a decent breeze on that mountain ridge.⁸

Whether he's trying to nap or not, he's facing outward from the edge of his tent, and gets a surprise when “he lifted up his eyes, and behold! three men were standing before him” (Genesis 18:2), “three traveling strangers.”⁹ They're out in the brightness and the frying heat, unprotected from the UV rays that could give a sunburn in a matter of minutes. And this seems odd. Travelers back then knew better than to press on during the heat of the day; they'd seek shelter, somewhere to wait out the heat and regain strength.¹⁰ What does Abraham see? Men old or young, looking noble or looking poor, seeming local or seeing very foreign, dignified and put together or “in a lowly and wretched form: naked, hungry, tired from the journey, and as exiles”?¹¹ How do they seem?

The fact that they're 'standing before him' doesn't mean they're hovering close by; they're far enough away, and stationary, so it doesn't look as though they're headed his way, meaning Abraham has a fully free choice how to react to their presence on his horizon.¹² So what will Abraham do? Well, we're told that “he saw them, and he ran to meet them from the entrance of the tent” (Genesis 18:2). That right there says something profound about Abraham's heart: “he ran to receive those strangers with love.”¹³ He chose to intercept them, chose to close the distance, chose interaction over the hope of mutual avoidance. When he got there, “he bowed himself to the earth” (Genesis 18:2), a dramatic gesture of deference he didn't have to make, but he did it as a sign of “his great ardor, his great humility.”¹⁴ When he speaks, he addresses them – or at least the one who looks like he's in charge – as adonai, 'lord' or 'lords' – and he describes himself as “your servant” (Genesis 18:3). He addressed them “with honor and deference,”¹⁵ in a way that went “considerably beyond the requirements of conventional etiquette.”¹⁶ “Without knowing the identity of the visitors, he approached them with such alacrity and respect, like a slave to his masters,”¹⁷ “to offer the grace of hospitality to strangers”¹⁸ whom he treats “like they are royal visitors.”¹⁹ He doesn't treat them as a project of pity or means to an end; he tremendously exalts their dignity.

His voice dripping with politeness, he impresses on them that he'd deem it an honor if they'd be willing to come to stay with him for sanctuary from the day's demands, no matter who they are; and so he rejects the tempting us-versus-them outlook.²⁰ “O lord, if, please, I have found grace in your eyes, please do not pass by your servant” (Genesis 18:3). And so Abraham “saluted them and invited them to lodge with him and partake of his hospitality,”²¹ to “refresh your hearts; after that, you may pass on, since you have come to your servant” (Genesis 18:5). He promises not to delay them beyond the heat of the day; he won't inconvenience them.

What kind of hospitality does Abraham have in mind? Well, “let a little water please be brought, and wash your feet” (Genesis 18:4) – that was the first step in welcome, because when everybody's wearing sandals in a very dusty world, that's the first step in becoming comfortable. Abraham invites them to “rest yourselves under the tree” (Genesis 18:4) – to enjoy the prime location of shade out of the sun, and there to let things be brought to them instead of having to fetch them themselves. Finally, Abraham says he'll “bring a morsel of bread,” just enough that “you may refresh your hearts” by this snack on Abraham's dime (Genesis 18:5). These three things – water for footwashing, shelter to rest, and a snack – were the bare minimums of hospitality.²² In listing just the barebones provisions, he “suggests the poverty of his hospitality..., minimizing it and showing it was nothing extraordinary.”²³ It won't be a burden, just things readily at hand; they needn't feel they're imposing.²⁴

So this triad of passersby agree to not pass by: “Yes, do as you have said” (Genesis 18:5). And Abraham wastes no time – that much is obvious! Already, though he'd begun sitting, no sooner had he seen them than “he ran to meet them” (Genesis 18:2). Abraham “immediately is energetic and eager in his duties,”²⁵ “as if jumping for joy and holding countless good things in his hands.”²⁶ Now, in order to arrange for their needs, “Abraham hurried into the tent to Sarah, and said, 'Hurry!'” (Genesis 18:6). Despite it being her siesta too, Sarah hurled herself promptly into action. While she did, “Abraham ran” to the next spot in their compound, assigning a different job to one of his trusted servants, who “hastened” to do just as he was told (Genesis 18:7).

This is all the more impressive given that Abraham's nearly a century old, and it's the hot part of a summer day. It's the wrong time of day, wrong time of year, and wrong time of lifespan to be active – and yet, for the sake of being a good host, Abraham disregarded all those wrong times. “He makes haste in all things; all things are done urgently; nothing is done leisurely.”²⁷ Given how long these tasks will take, there's no sense in being slow to start. “His soul, full of joy, was eager to carry out the reception without delay..., for in a wise man's house, no one is slow in showing kindness,” but rather, all are “full of zeal to do service to their guests.”²⁸

What Abraham promised to his guests was water – presumably some to drink as well as to then wash their feet in²⁹ – and some plain and modest grub in the shade. But it turns out that Abraham's idea of humble service is to “say little and do much.”³⁰ “Abraham hurried into the tent to Sarah, and he said, 'Hurry! Three seahs of fine flour! Knead it and make cakes!'” (Genesis 18:6). Fine flour isn't the rough stuff for everyday bread; it's more finely ground, a higher-quality wheat flour closer to our cake flour. So, of course, Abraham asks for round breads, like the ones the Israelites will later make from mashed manna (Numbers 11:8). This was a popular kind of bread baked on hot stones or immersed in hot ashes. And Abraham asks Sarah to use three seahs, one for each of the guests – which makes sense until you realize that a seah is about two gallons of flour!³¹ Now, I know we go overboard with the baked goods table at our church events, but that seems like an unreasonable amount, don't you think? Three guys can't eat all that bread; Abraham's aiming at filling a doggie bag for them.

Alright, but then “Abraham ran to the herd and took a calf, tender and good; and he gave it to the young man, who hastened to prepare it” (Genesis 18:7). Before industrialized farming and refrigeration, meat in general was only on the menu sporadically. But even then, if Abraham wanted to treat his guests, he might go for sheep or goat; instead, he chooses a veal dinner, a much rarer treat.³² Nor does he select an animal at random or by its expendability. He personally surveys his herd and chooses a calf in the best health, one with the right balance of muscle development and fattening – “a fatted calf.”³³ This is as special an occasion as the return of a prodigal son (Luke 15:23). To Abraham, every guest is as valuable as a lost child come home – such is the heart of Abraham that “the occasion is a treasure for him.”³⁴ So, just as Abraham trusts his wife of many decades with the baking, he trusts his herdsman with butchering and then boiling the meat, probably in a big pot over the same oven where Sarah's baking her bread-cakes.³⁵ This should take a couple hours.

In the meantime, Abraham decides that there's one final element to a balanced meal. So Abraham “took curds and milk” (Genesis 18:8). Goat milk was considered easy to digest and energizing for a journey,³⁶ and Abraham, having milked his flocks this morning, would now boil it to freshen it back up; he didn't know it, but he was killing off bacteria.³⁷ Abraham also gathered curds – churned like butter during the morning work-shift – and then found cups and dishes for each guest. These weren't time-consuming tasks, so imagine Abraham is probably running around checking up on Sarah and the servant, which surely they appreciated (ha!).³⁸

Gathering all these dishes, Abraham takes them to where the three men are resting under the tree, awaiting their meal, which Abraham now assembles “in a much more extravagant manner than he originally promised.”³⁹ He took this food, “and he gave it to their face” – in other words, he served them himself, as a decent host, rather than having his staff of servants serve them and him together. But rather than join them for the meal, Abraham took things a step further: “He stood by them under the tree, and they ate” (Genesis 18:8). While not obtrusive, he let the three sit and eat together, but he stood nearby “like a servant,” a responsive waiter,⁴⁰ so that “if somewhere anything should be lacking for the convenience of the guests, he is eager to set it right speedily.”⁴¹

And all this Abraham did in the heat of the day, at the cost of his own siesta, for three outsiders he's never met. Clearly, then, Abraham's royal future hasn't puffed him up with too much pride to serve, nor has been chosen and marked apart separated his heart from the common humanity he shares with us all; the events of Genesis 17 have, if anything, made Abraham more embracing of outsiders, more accommodating to put others before himself, more eager to bend over backwards to be a blessing.⁴²

Once the trio had finished chowing down, that was the time – after the meal – when deeper conversations were able to take place; you just don't transact business on an empty stomach. So now the guests have something to say: “Where is Sarah your wife?” (Genesis 18:9). Which, first of all, under ordinary circumstances, might be a rude question! The lady of the household wasn't a public person; her whereabouts are none of a male stranger's business, in that culture.⁴³ But, on second thought, they don't just ask Abraham where his wife is; they ask him about her by name. If they'd asked, “Where is Sarai your wife?”, Abraham would have been wondering where he and they had crossed paths before. But they ask him, “Where is Sarah your wife?” – using the new name she's had for, at maximum, three months, and maybe even just a few days, and which Abraham may himself still be getting used to calling her, if he's even started. These strangers using that name is an anomaly that's sure to make the hair on the back of Abraham's neck stand on end!⁴⁴

So it's hardly a surprise when Abraham is too astonished to object to what might otherwise seem impertinence. “Behold,” he confesses as best he knows, “in the tent!” (Genesis 18:9). Unbeknownst to Abraham, actually “Sarah was listening at the tent entrance behind him” (Genesis 18:10), from the same place where Abraham was when this episode began.⁴⁵ And whereas the guests asked their question as a group, the next comment comes from just one: “I will surely return to you at the time of life, and behold, a son to Sarah your wife!” (Genesis 18:10). It almost sounds like a vague wish, spoken in ignorance of its impossibility; but from someone who knows Sarah's name, the meaning is plain: Sarah will finally have reason to celebrate Mother's Day!

Now, all of a sudden, everything else becomes clearer, too. Clearly, someone in this group, if not the whole group, plans to return to them at the time when a son will be born (Genesis 18:10), the same son whose birth the LORD had previously promised Abraham despite Sarah's absolute natural impediments to that promise (Genesis 17:21; 18:11). Now, is any guest going to declare that the 89-year-old matriarch of the house, who is obviously not pregnant, is on the cusp of bearing a son? Not unless the guest is either an insane person, or a prophet with a revelation, or something not of this earthly plane. And later on, when two of the men peel off to do their own thing, we meet them again next chapter and find them referred to as “two angels” (Genesis 19:1). This group is no set of human men after all; these strangers are stranger than Abraham could have known!

So some early Jewish readers said we have here a group of “three angels in the likeness of men.”⁴⁶ In particular, they concluded, these three were “Michael, Raphael, and Gabriel,” each come on his own particular mission.⁴⁷ And if that's who these are, that alone has dazzled some readers to consider, in their words, “the vast happiness and blessedness of that house where angels did not shrink from halting and receiving hospitality from men.”⁴⁸ As to how they could accept that hospitality, it's generally suggested that “they gave the appearance of eating and drinking,”⁴⁹ so “they gave him to believe that they did eat,”⁵⁰ though – as one reader sharply remarked – “only the worst fool would try to pry further into the ways and means of a holy mystery.”⁵¹

But maybe the mystery is even deeper. This whole chapter opened with the summary statement that “the LORD appeared to him” (Genesis 18:1). During the after-dinner conversation, we suddenly hear that “the LORD said to Abraham..., 'Is anything too wonderful for the LORD?'” (Genesis 18:13-14). And in the sequel, after the two others depart, “Abraham still stood before the LORD” (Genesis 18:22). So it seems more likely that we have here a mixed group: “the one God and the two others following him, his angels.”⁵² For “one of the three, who is both God and Lord..., is Lord of the angels,”⁵³ but “two of the three men were merely angels.”⁵⁴

But didn't Jesus say, “Abraham your father rejoiced that he might see my day; he saw it, and was glad” (John 8:56)? With the benefit of hindsight, wasn't this meeting perhaps the occasion to which Jesus was referring? So many early Christians quickly realized that the LORD visiting Abraham was, in fact, him – that “two of the three were angels, but one was the Son of God, with whom Abraham spoke.”⁵⁵ Before ever the Son became incarnate of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, he appeared as “a guest of Abraham.”⁵⁶ The three, then, as one medieval Egyptian hymn suggested, might have been “Michael and Gabriel, with our Savior in their midst.”⁵⁷

Others have probed even deeper, asking why Genesis switches so unstably between the singular and the plural here, and why three measures of flour to accompany a single calf, unless maybe there's something about God that shows three figures and one Lord. So further reflection led some Christians to ponder that, in this scene, Abraham “saw the Trinity typified... He saw three, but worshipped their unity,”⁵⁸ for he “recognized the mystery of the Trinity.”⁵⁹ Whether he did or not, Abraham has the inexplicable role of providing rest for the Lord of the Sabbath (Mark 2:28), of bringing water to cleanse the One before whom heaven is impure (Job 15:15), of offering a calf and bread to feed the Owner of the cattle on a thousand hills (Psalm 50:10-12).⁶⁰ Abraham received God as a houseguest, waited on God's table – as one early Christian remarked, “everything he does is mystical, everything is filled with mystery.”⁶¹ How could it not be?

And this mystery sets the precedent for how Abraham's seed might continue to host God in their midst. After an exodus from Egypt, the LORD told Moses to have Israel “make me a sanctuary, that I may dwell in their midst” (Exodus 25:8). And at this sanctuary, they were to provide table service to the LORD, just as their Father Abraham had. Within this sanctuary, on the pure table, the priests were each week to “take fine flour,” of the same kind Sarah used, “and bake twelve loaves from it; two-tenths of an ephah” – an ephah being three seahs – “shall be in each loaf” (Leviticus 24:5), meaning each week this bread of the presence would call for more fine flour than Sarah used. Outside the sanctuary, on the Table of the LORD (Malachi 1:7) placed “at the entrance of the tent” (Exodus 29:11), they were to regularly serve meat as good and tender as Abraham's calf, “a male without blemish... from the herd” (Leviticus 1:3), often accompanied by “loaves of fine flour” (Leviticus 7:12). All these similarities are no happy little accident. On Abraham's template, Abraham's seed continued to offer God their hospitality, with priests and Levites standing at attention, having “come near the altar to minister, to burn a food offering to the LORD” (Exodus 30:20). Such was the whole tabernacle/temple system: hospitality!

But then, said one of the rabbis, “every action that Abraham performed himself for the ministering angels, the Holy One... performed himself for Abraham's descendants,” reciprocating Abraham's favors as any good guest would.⁶² And that rabbi spoke more truly than he knew. Another rabbi explained that the LORD would repay Abraham's hospitality three times over to his children: once in the desert, once when settled in the land, and best of all, in the days of the Messiah.⁶³ And so, just as Abraham had provided a meal of hospitality to the LORD, now, in Jesus the Messiah, the LORD had returned to reciprocate that service, “giving back to the sons their right to the hospitality which their father had extended to him at another time.”⁶⁴ Now, at the Table of the LORD, it would be the LORD – Jesus Christ – who feeds Abraham and his children. At the Last Supper, as Abraham had once brought water for washing the LORD's feet, so now the LORD kneels to wash the feet of true sons of Father Abraham (John 13:5).⁶⁵ Where Abraham once brought ashen bread-cakes and the flesh of a fatted calf, so now the LORD sets the table with his own body and blood under bread and wine for all true sons and daughters of Father Abraham's life of faith. Where Abraham stood by with sweet milk and butter, so now the LORD Jesus pours out on his diners the sweetness of the Holy Spirit. Abraham's hospitality returns to his children – to us!

His apostles, their hearts refreshed and made strong to serve at table (Luke 22:26-27), went forth to spread this beautiful twist. The Greeks and Romans were firm believers in hospitality, because their myths were also full of gods coming to earth in disguise to test mortals. Homer portrays the goddess Athena, determined to prod lost Odysseus' demoralized son Telemachus into a necessary journey of growth, disguising herself as a man standing outside their house, so as to spur Telemachus into offering her the hospitality his mother's wicked suitors wouldn't; Telemachus does so with an almost Abrahamic gusto, rushing out to bring her in and break out the fine china, and only when she suddenly flew up through the skylight did he realize that “this must be a god.”⁶⁶ The Roman writer Ovid shares a myth where the gods Jupiter and Mercury tested a thousand homes, finding all closed to strangers but the “reed-roofed shack” of the elderly couple Philemon and Baucis, who made cushions and a stew for the travelers; in return, Philemon and Baucis saw their shack become a temple and were granted a wish: to never live without each other.⁶⁷ Ovid recounted also another myth where Jupiter, Mercury, and Neptune – three gods – tested a widowed farmer named Hyrieus, who, not knowing who they were, pressed his hospitality on them, led them into his smoky cottage, and served beans and veggies and wine before sacrificing his own plow ox to roast for them; revealing themselves, the gods then offered to grant him a wish, and he requested and received a son: Orion.⁶⁸ No wonder that, when Paul and Barnabas worked miracles in the Gentile world, crowds mistook them for Jupiter and Mercury and shouted that “the gods have come down to us in the likeness of men!”, and tried to sacrifice to them – the crowds were imitating these stories (Acts 14:11-13). Greeks and Romans were chronically on the lookout for the possibility that maybe, in the guise of any stranger, “some god's come down from heaven.”⁶⁹ There were other Greek stories, as that of Euphorion, who “received [gods] in his home” without knowing it “and, from that time on, offered hospitality to all men.”⁷⁰ It's no wonder Greeks and Romans emphasized hospitality – for, as Homer said, “from Zeus are all strangers and beggars.”⁷¹

As in the pagan stories, so in Abraham's, the whole episode was like a candid camera show, meant “to get the measure of the man” while he least expected it.⁷² When the pop quiz came his way, Abraham gave hospitality to God and his angels while “their diviner nature was not apparent to him,”⁷³ which is how he “passes and surpasses the test of his virtue and kindness.”⁷⁴ Abraham passed without knowing he was being tested because this must have been what he'd do in any and every such situation – that's why later Jews explained that “the righteous man was very hospitable, for he pitched his tent at the crossroads... and welcomed everyone – rich and poor, kings and rulers, the crippled and the helpless, friends and strangers, neighbors and passersby – all on equal terms.”⁷⁵ And after passing the test, it's no surprise many read the announcement of a son as, effectively, a response – if Hyrieus can get an Orion, all the more should Abraham and Sarah have an Isaac “as a reward for their good deeds.”⁷⁶ “Because of his faith and hospitality, a son was given to him in his old age.”⁷⁷

Other Jewish literature tells similar stories – the Book of Judges has a Danite man named Manoah who, with his wife, unknowingly encounters the Angel of the LORD; they ask him to stay for a meal of roast goat, but he ascends to heaven in the flame, though not before declaring his name was too 'wonderful' for them to know – but their reward was that Manoah's wife, once barren, gave birth to a son: Samson (Judges 13:2-25). Then there is the Jewish novel of Tobit, where a major plot point is God sending the angel Raphael in disguise as Azariah, son of Tobit's kinsman Hananiah, to accompany the blinded Tobit's son Tobiah on an important mission; only at the end does 'Azariah' reveal himself as Raphael, who'd only seemed to eat and drink mortal food and who then blessed them with peace before vanishing. “I was sent to put you to the test,” Raphael explained, but also to bring healing to Tobit and to arrange a good marriage for Tobiah to his cousin Sarah (Tobit 5:4-7; 12:14-22). No surprise that one rabbi decreed: “Let your home be open wide for hospitality.”⁷⁸

Writing to Jews living in Italy, steeped in the Old Testament and surrounded by Roman thought, the preacher to the Hebrews urged them to “not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares” (Hebrews 13:2), a comment “referring precisely to the patriarch” above all others.⁷⁹ The first Christians persisted to keep open the possibility that any “stranger... should be perhaps an angel” in disguise;⁸⁰ and they had good reason to keep taking “seriously the possibility of angelic visitation to humans.”⁸¹ There was once a monk in the Egyptian desert named Agathon, who one day, on his way in the city to sell crafts, came across a leper too sick and disfigured to walk, who implored him to carry him into the city. There he sat as Abba Agathon sold his wares, and after each sale, the leper needled him to buy him some food or drink. After a long day of these impositions, when Agathon had sold everything and moved to leave, the leper urged Agathon to show him one more act of love and carry him back to his former spot by the desert road. Agathon obliged, but as he turned to go, the leper told him, “Agathon, you've been blessed by the Lord in heaven and on earth.” Surprised at the comment, Agathon turned back – and “he didn't see anyone; it was an angel of the Lord who'd come to test him.”⁸² So “learn from blessed Abraham, brethren, to receive strangers gladly.”⁸³

Suppose we believed, though, that what happened to Abraham, what happened to Manoah and Tobiah, what happened to Agathon could actually happen to us. Would we learn from them what to do? Suppose an angel, disguised now as then, should be sent our way to test our character when faced with a stranger outside “our own culture, clan, or clique.”⁸⁴ How would that test turn out for you and your family? How would that test go for us as a church? What would it tell about our nation, in the year of our Lord 2025 – what do current affairs suggest would befall an angel seeking American hospitality? Do we personally, ecclesially, or nationally follow in the footsteps of Abraham when it comes to the poor, the needy, the downtrodden, the foreigner in our midst, or any other stranger? Or might the angelic test show us up, shame us, condemn us as all too “callous and uncaring”?⁸⁵

When St. Paul wrote to the Romans, he urged them to “outdo one another in showing honor,” to “serve the Lord,” to “contribute to the needs of the saints,” to “pursue hospitality” (Romans 12:13). He's saying that the images from Ovid and even Homer are insufficient. Their characters received their supposed visitations mainly once the disguised deity knocked; but Abraham, like Telemachus on steroids, leapt from the door to intercept and implore – he proactively pursued hospitality.⁸⁶ Perhaps Abraham was sitting at his tent entrance on the lookout.⁸⁷ One rabbi even imagined that Abraham habitually “would go forth and make the rounds everywhere, and when he found wayfarers, he brought them in to his house.”⁸⁸ In the early church, there were a pair of brothers who inherited much from their father; and while one gave all his share away, the other one built a small place where, with some like-minded brethren, “he took in every stranger, every sick person, every old person, and every pauper,” slowly spending his inheritance in supplying their needs, but eventually achieved such zeal that “he even seated himself on the highways and gathered up the afflicted.” In living like this, the verdict went, he “demonstrated the work of Abraham.”⁸⁹ To a greater or lesser degree, St. Paul says, so ought we.

The Lord himself said that, on the Last Day, he'll say to those gathered at his right hand that “I was a stranger, and you welcomed me,” in the same way Abraham had (Matthew 25:35). “When?” they'll ask. “As you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me” (Matthew 25:40). Not from Zeus but from Christ are all strangers, all beggars, all the least and lowest! And so “when in his name you give evidence of attention to the visitor, you will gain a reward just as if you have welcomed him.”⁹⁰ “We should welcome visiting brothers as if we were welcoming the Lord's arrival..., for in this way Abraham welcomed those who indeed looked like men, yet he saw the Lord in them.”⁹¹ But Jesus broadened Abrahamic hospitality to many works of mercy like unto it (Matthew 25:35-36). So when a young Roman soldier named Martin saw a shivering beggar one winter day, and he sliced his military cloak in half to share it with the man, he dreamed he saw Jesus wearing that half before his angels, declaring “it was he who had been clothed in the person of the beggar.”⁹² As shocking as is the thought that any stranger in need we might meet could be an angel sent to test our mercy, so much greater is the thought that every stranger in need is, vicariously, Christ, insofar as Christ claims for himself whatever treatment we give those in need – and promises to reward us accordingly, as Father Abraham and Mother Sarah learned for themselves. So, as a great bishop once said, “let us all imitate this and display much zeal in practicing hospitality..., to lay up for ourselves as well the enjoyment of immortal blessings. You see, if we practice hospitality, we shall welcome Christ [and his angels] here, and he in turn will welcome us in those mansions prepared for those who love him.”⁹³ May we often pass the test of entertaining Christ and his angels unawares, vicariously or in person in disguise – for in this is the path to blessing and virtue and eternity. Amen.

New Names, New Hope

Content. That's how Abram felt, I'm sure, as he watched his son Ishmael grow into his thirteenth year. Abram, growing older day by day (as one tends to do), figured he had everything stitched up. He'd found his niche in the world. He'd received the blessing of God, he'd gained the son he always wanted, he'd achieved a measure of peace (however tense) in his tents, he lived in a land where he felt at home, he believed in a bright future for his son's seed after him – everything was coming up Abram. And then “the LORD appeared to him” (Genesis 17:1), and what had been comfortable and settled soon... wasn't.

The LORD introduces himself in a way that catches our attention: “I am El Shaddai! Walk before me and be blameless” (Genesis 17:1). Now, that's an interesting name for God. See, later on, God seems to say to Moses that “I am the LORD; I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob as El Shaddai, but by my name 'The LORD' I did not make myself known to them” (Exodus 6:2-3). When we read Genesis, we've heard plenty about 'the LORD,' which is just our way of glossing the unpronouncable Hebrew name 'YHWH.' Ever since chapter 2, Genesis has clearly identified YHWH; but now Moses is hinting that this name is being read back into a time when it wasn't actually known – that it's a convenience for the Israelite reader, not what a microphone would've captured in the Middle Bronze Age. Instead, this same God more commonly introduced himself as El Shaddai.

So what does it mean to call God 'El Shaddai'? Well... we don't entirely know. The oldest translators were just guessing at it, and “modern scholarship has reached no consensus.”¹ We know it was obviously a very ancient name for God; it only shows up in the Bible during the time of the patriarchs or in poetry that's deliberately old-fashioned. The only three people in the Bible who have names referring to 'Shaddai' were all born over a full generation before the exodus (Numbers 1:5-12), and we know of at least one maybe-Hebrew minor official in Egypt in the 1300s BC.² But scholars have many guesses for where the name 'Shaddai' came from, like 'he who is sufficient,' or even 'the destroyer.'³ Your Bible probably guesses that El Shaddai means 'God Almighty,' but the most popular guess is that it's 'God of the Mountain,' the True Rock of the world.⁴ He's the stable and exalted God from whom blessings roll down in streams, whose touch brings life, fertility, nourishment.⁵

This is the God who's reaching out again to Abram. And he says, “I will set my covenant between me and you, and will multiply you very exceedingly” (Genesis 17:2), “and I will establish my covenant between me and you and your seed after you throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant” (Genesis 17:7). That's a bold statement God's making, because so far we've heard of just one other “everlasting covenant,” and it's God's pledge to sustain creation no matter what, to uphold the existence of life itself (Genesis 9:16). God is assigning his covenant with Abram the same kind of duration as life in the world. One medieval monk remarked here that God's covenant with Abram “will certainly not only be preserved for the whole of the time of this life..., but it will also be celebrated in the age to come eternally.”⁶ To put it mildly, “God has not forgotten his promises to him”; just the opposite, God keeps making them stronger, bolder, more sweeping, more daring!⁷

And in this chapter, this renewal and strengthening of the covenant is basically laid out by God in three parts.⁸ The first part, verses 4-8, is anchored by God's phrase 'As for me': this one's all about what God will do to hold up his end of the covenant, which is our major focus today. The second part is anchored by God's phrase 'As for you': this one covers what Abram is supposed to do to honor the covenant, which was our focus last week since it so deeply concerns the covenant sign and covenant command of circumcision. But then there is, surprisingly, a third part to the covenant, which we wouldn't expect. And it's anchored by God's phrase 'As for Sarai your wife,' meaning that she's becoming a covenant partner somehow.⁹

Up until now, zero of God's conversations with Abram have even mentioned Sarai, although some of God's acts have taken account of her (Genesis 12:17). But now, for the first time, Sarai is actually brought into covenant with God. He speaks her name. He recognizes her as Abram's partner, yes, but also as someone standing before God in her own right. And based on the writing so far, we'd expect the section 'As for Sarai' to tell us about what are Sarai's obligations in the covenant. But that's not what happens. Instead, we hear God telling Abram all about what he, God, aims to do in Sarai's life. And that's fascinating on the heels of the last chapter, where Sarai's rival Hagar, whom Sarai had humbled and afflicted, suddenly found herself recognized and consoled by God. For thirteen years, Sarai had lived in the knowledge that her husband had spoken to God, and her rival and servant had spoken to God, but that Sarai had been kept out of that loop. But now God talks about her to Abram in her very own section of the covenant, dealing with what God aims to do for her.

And the central feature of that pledge is this: “I will bless her, and moreover I have given you a son by her” (Genesis 17:16). This has got to be confusing and concerning to Abram. Has he misheard something here? Abram's already got a son, which Sarai arranged for him to obtain by Hagar – is that what God means? After all, when God had promised Abram a biological son (Genesis 15:4), he specified a father but not a mother;¹⁰ so naturally, when Sarai didn't become a mother, she reasoned that the LORD was obstructing her efforts to conceive, and now that door had closed, so clearly a surrogate was required (Genesis 16:2). It was the only logical solution, since hoping against hope would just be senseless. And now God is saying that the locked door they gave up banging on was the prize door after all? Now God's saying that their whole scheme, which had paid out at great cost over thirteen years, was a detour away from the promise? Now God is insisting barren Sarai is a mother to Abram's son – God speaking so confidently that he puts the future in the past tense?

What a joke! “Shall a child be born to a man who's a hundred years old?” Or shall this wife of his actually get pregnant and successfully bring a baby boy to birth despite being ninety years of age (Genesis 17:17)? This is utterly ridiculous. “The promises exceed human nature; it was like promising to make people out of stones.”¹¹ It just doesn't make sense to Abram, to say nothing of being time-consuming and troublesome. Abram's content how things are, regardless how Sarai might feel about it (Genesis 17:18). But when he challenges God, God doubles down: “Your wife shall bear a son to you.... I will establish my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his seed after him” (Genesis 17:19).

Against everything Abram could say, God insists: Sarai's time has come now that time's long run out. Even if it'll take a miracle – actually, especially since it'll take a miracle, precisely since it'll take a miracle – God is determined to give her the recognition of which she's been starved. Abram is thus summarily disabused of the notion that Sarai had no relevance to God's promises to him. God now stitches her ineradicably into the quilt of his covenant plan. Abram may no longer think about the promises of God, may no longer plan for his legacy, without her: “She is neither an accessory nor an adjunct, but an equal.”¹² It's her son, the one yet to be conceived and born, who can already expect that, once he exists, he'll sire seed who'll inherit God's everlasting covenant.

All this sudden reversal, by the way, is couched in the language of blessing: “I will bless her, and moreover I have given you a son by her” (Genesis 17:16). When God had first launched his world-changing relationship with Abram, those are the words he said to him: “I will bless you” (Genesis 12:2). Now, without taking any of that back, God's launching the same kind of world-changing relationship with Sarai: “I will bless her” (Genesis 17:16). From here on out, what they each can hope for becomes “extraordinarily parallel.”¹³

Not only does God promise Abram a son by Sarai, but he reminds Abram there will be seed in abundance. That wasn't new news; long already, God told Abram, “I will make your seed as the dust of the earth” in its countless extent (Genesis 13:16), and then later gave him a prediction of seed comparable to the stars beyond Abram's math (Genesis 15:5). But that seed is sure a special focus of this chapter. So far, the Bible's used the word 'seed' in Abram's story a total of eight times over five chapters; now, this chapter alone adds a perfect seven – more than any Bible chapter has used the word until now, even in creation.

Plus, for the first time, two creation words get newly looped into the promise. To Adam and Eve, God commanded, “Be fruitful and multiply” (Genesis 1:28). To Noah and family, God commanded, “Be fruitful and multiply” (Genesis 9:1). Now, for the third phase, God brings back the words not as a command, not even as an invitation, but as a divine intervention. “I will multiply you very exceedingly” (Genesis 17:2), “I will make you exceedingly fruitful” (Genesis 17:6). If Adam and Noah were to multiply themselves, for Abram it's an act of God and not of man. And what's more, for Abram God keeps adding this word 'exceedingly,' like sand and stars exceed Abram's eyes and mind.¹⁴ In fact, this multiplication 'exceedingly exceedingly' mirrors how the Bible spoke of the waters prevailing “exceedingly exceedingly” over the earth in the flood (Genesis 7:19). God wills to make Abram a human flood prevailing on the face of the earth! They'll flourish with the full force of fertility.

So then God turns to the social ramifications of making Abram multiply and be fruitful. Already God had said to Abram, “I will make you into a great nation” (Genesis 12:2). But now, God tells him, “I will make you into nations,” plural (Genesis 17:6). In fact, he goes so far as to label Abram a future “father of a multitude of nations” (Genesis 17:5). This is a major expansion of the prior promise.¹⁵ And now God adds about Sarai, “I will bless her, and she shall become nations” (Genesis 17:16). Her future, as much as his, is supposed to include multiplying into more than a single nation could accommodate; many nations will call Abram 'Dad,' Sarai 'Mom.' If only Abram had been given this promise, we could say that the Ishmaelite Arabs and Midianites would suffice to fulfill it (Genesis 17:20; 25:2).¹⁶ But Sarai is ancestress of only two nations: the Edomites, by her grandson Esau, and the Israelites, by her grandson Jacob. So maybe they'd be father and mother of many nations in the sense of “teacher of many nations,”¹⁷ carrying out “a leadership role for the family of man”?¹⁸ Otherwise, what blessing would it be to trace pagan nations to Abram? No wonder some Jews glossed this as “an assembly of a congregation of just nations” who would come from Abram as father and Sarai as mother.¹⁹

But as wild as this upgrade is, God has more to say. To Abram he announces, “I will make you into nations, and kings shall come from you” (Genesis 17:6). Nor is Sarai left out, since “she shall become nations; kings of peoples shall come from her” (Genesis 17:16). Before, Sarai's been captured by a king, Abram's feared and fought kings, and not until meeting Melchizedek did Abram ponder the mystery of a good king. But now Abram and Sarai will produce kings. In fact, “many nations and royal families will trace their ancestry” back to this couple.²⁰ At minimum, this can encompass kings “from the house of Judah and Ephraim and the Edomites.”²¹ But some Jews also read it as meaning that “kings who rule over nations shall come forth from you,”²² as in Israelite governors appointed kings over other nations – after all, didn't Moses envision that Abram's seed would “rule over many nations, but they shall not rule over you” (Deuteronomy 15:6)?²³

To commemorate these stunning promises, God does something we never would have expected: he remakes the man and the woman. And he remakes by renaming. “No longer shall your name be called Abram,” God tells Abram, stripping Abram's very name – his identity, his essence – away from him. But God swiftly reclothes him with a new self: “But your name shall be Abraham, for I have made you the father of a multitude of nations” (Genesis 17:5). If God had earlier promised to magnify Abram's name (Genesis 12:2), he's now done so literally, enhancing it by a bonus consonant. But Sarai isn't left out: “As for Sarai your wife, you shall not call her name Sarai, but Sarah shall be her name” (Genesis 17:5).

This is the first time in the Bible we see anybody's name change from one thing to another,²⁴ although this was a known practice in the ancient world, where some kings gave themselves a new name upon reaching power, or where some kings were given a new name when installed by a higher king (e.g., 2 Kings 23:34; 24:17).²⁵ God is both asserting authority over Abram and Sarai while also ennobling them and fitting them for a new role. It suggests “a real change in Abram's identity” as well as in Sarai's.²⁶ Perhaps, like some ancient Jews thought, it signified a “change in character to the betterment of soul.”²⁷ Both of them change their names by gaining the same Hebrew letter,²⁸ and Hebrew readers observed it happens to be one of the letters in God's sacred name YHWH, as if this were about “divinizing [Abram's and Sarai's] worldly name” by grace.²⁹ For both of them, “their natural names which they received at their birth in the flesh were changed.”³⁰ Those natural names, those old names, had come from their shared father, the pagan Terah (Genesis 11:27; 20:12). When Abram was called to leave his father's house, he still went forth marked by his father's act of naming, as did Sarai (Genesis 12:1); but now God strips away the last bit of Terah's influence, replacing it with the fatherhood of God.³¹

As a rule, “names given to men by God,” such as the name 'Abraham' to Abram or 'Sarah' to Sarai, “always signify some gratuitous gift bestowed on them by him.”³² That was the judgment of one of history's greatest theologians. And it makes sense, because in the ancient world, “giving a name to a person amounted to creation of a new reality and destiny.”³³ Such renaming was effectively “an act of new creation.”³⁴ God thus “comes to propose a new covenant and to give Abram [and Sarai] a new charge,” a new mission in life; this is a sacred commissioning, a start to a new adventure together as a new man and new woman.³⁵ For Abraham and for Sarah, “everything rings with newness!”³⁶ Their new names engrave on them their new hope and new purpose.

Formerly he was Abram, apparently 'exalted father.' Now he's Abraham, which the text puns as 'father of a multitude.' Genesis doesn't give us any comment on Sarai's change in name, but the basic sense is 'princess.' These days, most scholars judge that the old and new names don't actually differ in meaning; they're variations in dialect.³⁷ But some have guessed that both new names hint at an outward shift away from self toward a universal focus.³⁸ It's not enough for this man to be an exalted father; he's got to be a father to the multitudes. It's not enough for this woman to be a princess to her family; she's got to be “a princess to all mankind.”³⁹ And it's remarkable how aspirational both names are. Abram, while yet a father of one, is called by God a father of a multitude of nations; Sarai, while a nomad's wife in obscurity, is called by God a princess who shall rule! Both new names are oriented toward the future, toward a destiny not yet experienced, not yet tasted in its fruit.⁴⁰

“I will give to you,” God then announces to Abraham (and thereby also to Sarah), “and to your seed after you, the land of your sojournings, all the land of Canaan” (Genesis 17:8). We knew that already, because twenty-four years earlier, Abram heard him say that “to your seed I will give this land” (Genesis 12:7), and some years after that, Abram heard that “all the land that you see, I will give to you and your seed forever” (Genesis 13:15) – but now there's a new feature: he'll give them this land “for an everlasting possession” (Genesis 17:8). That sure sounds like it couldn't be alienated from them, couldn't be stolen, couldn't be lost. God would see to it that Abraham's seed would always hold this land as their grant, generation after generation. In one Pharisee's words, God was “revealing” to Abraham “how great nations and kings would spring from him, and how they would win possession, by war, of all Canaan from Sidon to Egypt.”⁴¹

That everlasting possession of land is nestled in the context of an “everlasting covenant,” and listen closely to how God describes the point of the covenant: “to be God to you and to your seed after you” (Genesis 17:7), “and I will be their God” (Genesis 17:8). We've heard before about how the LORD chose and led and made a covenant with Abram, but we haven't even yet heard God refer to himself as Abram's God, much less as the God of his seed. But now we hear of an ongoing relationship, of God giving himself to Abraham and his seed, of God taking them for his own treasured people. El Shaddai isn't just Abram's personal god, the way so many in his world had personal gods they were attached to; he's becoming the patron deity of the seed of Abraham, and of however many nations they become. Where other so-called gods were committed first to a place and only secondarily to whoever happened to live in it, El Shaddai commits himself first to a people, the seed of Abraham, and then gives them a place, a land, to be theirs.⁴² God is now “irrevocably committed to Abraham and his descendants and to their possession of living space.”⁴³ They will always be able to count on him as their “redeemer God,”⁴⁴ “with assistance from [God] in all situations.”⁴⁵ They have “covenants of peace” which give them hope in their privileged access to this God as their God (Ephesians 2:12). That's what God is pledging.

“And thus Abraham, having patiently waited, obtained the promise” (Hebrews 6:15). When God called Moses from the burning bush, he identified himself as “the God of Abraham” (Exodus 3:6). He explained he was the God they knew as El Shaddai, and that “I also established my covenant with them to give them the land of Canaan,” and that “I have remembered my covenant” (Exodus 6:2-5). All they had to do was trust him: “I will take you to be my people, and I will be your God.... I will bring you into the land that I swore to give to Abraham.... I will give it to you for a possession. I am the LORD!” (Exodus 6:6-8).

Once set free, he offered them the prospect of becoming “to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation” (Exodus 19:5-6). God spoke over and over about “the land of Canaan, which I give you for a possession” (Leviticus 14:34). In his last sermon, Moses prayed “that he may establish you today as his people, and that he may be your God, as he promised you and as he swore to your fathers” (Deuteronomy 29:12-13). Then Moses bade them follow Hoshea ben Nun, whom Moses had renamed 'Joshua' (Numbers 13:16), thus taking away from his name the letter added to Sarai's while adding the letter removed from Sarah's.⁴⁶ Where Moses had defeated “the kings of the land” east of the Jordan, Joshua led Israel to victory over thirty-one “kings of the land... on the west side of the Jordan” (Joshua 12:7-24). God “remembered his holy promise and Abraham his servant, so he... gave them the lands of the nations, and they took possession” (Psalm 105:42-44). “In those days, there was no king in Israel” (Judges 17:6), though Moses thought it inevitable (Deuteronomy 17:14-20).⁴⁷

In time the people “made Saul king before the LORD” (1 Samuel 11:15), though he soon learned that “the LORD has rejected you from being king over Israel” (1 Samuel 15:26). In his place, David was raised up first as king of one tribe, then of Israel as a whole (2 Samuel 2:11; 5:3). For his faithfulness, God pledged to him: “I will raise up your seed after you, who shall come from your body, and I will establish his kingdom” (2 Samuel 7:12). Looking back on the promise with his dying breath, David was grateful that God “has made with me an everlasting covenant” (2 Samuel 23:5). God had begun fulfilling his promise to bring forth kings from Abraham and Sarah. From David came Solomon, then Rehoboam, who provoked most tribes into seceding; now the kingdom was divided, Israel against Judah, each with its own king (1 Kings 12:16-20). This blessed “nation whose God is the LORD” (Psalm 33:12) was now effectively “two nations... divided into two kingdoms” (Ezekiel 37:22). So it followed in north and south, king after king after king.

Until there weren't. “The king of Assyria carried the Israelites away to Assyria,” while then “Judah was taken into exile out of its land” to Babylon (2 Kings 18:11; 25:21). The land given as an everlasting possession was no longer possessed by the seed of Abraham; there was no king left of Abraham and Sarah's line. Far from many nations, did they even qualify as one? What had become of the everlasting covenant? Was the LORD still their patron deity, still God to them and for them?

The prophets wrestled fiercely with the questions, striving to assure this unnationed people that there remained “an everlasting covenant” for them that included God's “sure, steadfast love for David” (Isaiah 55:3). Though the people were estranged from the land promised to them, it couldn't be forever: “I will set my eyes on them for good, and I will bring them back to this land” (Jeremiah 24:5), “I will give you the land of Israel” (Ezekiel 11:17). Then “your people shall be righteous,” and so “they shall possess the land forever” (Isaiah 60:21). In fact, “they and their children and their children's children shall dwell there forever” (Ezekiel 37:25).

“And I will make them one nation in the land, on the mountains of Israel..., and they shall no longer be two nations and no longer divided into two kingdoms” (Ezekiel 37:22). That reunified nation would attract nations and kings to their light (Isaiah 60:3) and would be nurtured by these nations and kings now at their service (Isaiah 60:16). For “the nations shall see your righteousness, and all the kings your glory, and you shall be called by a new name that the mouth of the LORD will give” (Isaiah 66:2). Her name will be changed from Azubah to Hephzibah, 'Forsaken' to 'My Delight Is In Her' (Isaiah 66:4). When God would do this, “I will set them in their land and multiply them” (Ezekiel 37:26); “I will multiply them, and they shall not be few” (Jeremiah 30:19). In fact, so blessed will they be that “the least one shall become a clan, and the smallest one a mighty nation” (Isaiah 60:22). Reunited as one nation, they would become a fruitful nation of nations.

But “one king shall be king over them all,” for “my servant David shall be king over them” (Ezekiel 37:22-24). When he reigns, God's everlasting covenant with Abraham will be made new. “I will make with them an everlasting covenant that I will not turn away from doing good to them..., an everlasting covenant that will never be forgotten” (Jeremiah 32:40; 50:5). “They shall be my people, and I will be their God, in faithfulness and righteousness” (Zechariah 8:8). “I will save them from all the backslidings in which they have sinned, and they shall be my people, and I will be their God” (Ezekiel 37:23), “for they shall return to me with their whole heart” (Jeremiah 24:7). “My dwelling place shall be with them, and I will be their God” (Ezekiel 37:27).

The prophets were looking for “Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham” (Matthew 1:1), “the Christ – the King of Israel” (Mark 15:32) on “the throne of his father David” (Luke 1:32). He's the one to whom this promise to Abraham and Sarah was always driving at.⁴⁸ To him did the Father say, “Ask of me, and I will make the nations your heritage and the ends of the earth your possession” (Psalm 2:8). He is the guarantor of the new and everlasting covenant; he is the king in whom all promises find their Yes (2 Corinthians 1:20).

And as God, as El Shaddai made flesh, he began changing names. “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah!... I tell you: You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it” (Matthew 16:17-18). Earlier, the prophet Isaiah preached to Israel: “Look to the rock from which you were hewn and to the quarry from which you were dug – look to Abraham your father, and to Sarah who bore you” (Isaiah 51:1-2). There the rock is Abram, whose name was changed to Abraham; here the rock is Simon, whose name is changed to 'Rock,' Peter, to make him a sort of new kingly, priestly, Abrahamic father for the church via this special participation in Christ.

But that same Church is also Christ's Bride, his Sarah, whose calling is to bear many sons and daughters for him unto eternal life. No wonder we read that “the number of the disciples multiplied greatly” (Acts 6:7), that her gospel was “bearing fruit and increasing” (Colossians 1:6), that Christ chose her “to bear fruit for God” (Romans 7:4). If Jesus is the True Abraham (in whose name Peter is to be an Abrahamic rock, and in whose name the apostles are all enthroned as kings), then the Church is the New Sarah, a mother blessed by God to be exceedingly fruitful in bearing children for her Abraham, that they might multiply and flood the earth with life.

Jesus said that “the gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations” (Matthew 24:14), and bade his enthroned apostles to “go therefore and make disciples of all nations” as their royal mission (Matthew 28:19). “And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the nations by faith, preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, 'In you shall all the nations be blessed'” (Galatians 3:8). They'd be blessed by being assimilated to the seed of Abraham; sharing Abraham's faith would qualify them as his children. After all, Abraham put his faith in a “God who gives life to the dead.... In hope he believed against hope, that he should become the father of many nations,” despite “his own body” being “as good as dead, since he was about a hundred years old, or when he considered the deadness of Sarah's womb” (Romans 4:17-19). So now Abraham's seed can include not only those with his DNA or who can find him on their family trees, but also “the one who shares the faith of Abraham, the father of us all; for it is written, 'I have made you the father of many nations'” (Romans 4:16-17). By that faith in the God who raised Jesus from the dead, “we know that we were promised to Abraham,” for “each Christian is... a spiritual child of Abraham” and of Sarah.⁴⁹ This multinational Church, with its many nations adopted into Christ the Seed of Abraham by faith, “is really the nation promised to Abraham by God when he told him that he would make him a father of many nations,” for “by our similar faith we have become children of Abraham..., a religious and righteous nation of like faith, and a delight to the Father.”⁵⁰

In this nation of nations, this one Church, “there is no 'Jew and Greek,' there is no 'slave or free,' there is no 'male and female,' for you are all one in Christ Jesus; and if you are Christ's, then you are Abraham's seed, heirs according to promise” (Galatians 3:28-29), and “if we endure, we will also reign with him” (2 Timothy 2:12). Abraham and his seed had a promise “that he would be heir of the world,” not just of one land alone, however treasured (Romans 4:13). And the Holy Spirit has been sent as “a guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory” (Ephesians 1:14). This will be a transformed world, a new creation, “the inheritance of the saints in light” (Colossians 1:12). It exists now as a pattern yet to be seen by mortal eyes, “an inheritance that is imperishable and undefiled and unfading, kept in heaven for you” (1 Peter 1:4). No wonder early Christians “joyfully accepted the plundering of your property, since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession – and an abiding one,” an everlasting possession (Hebrews 10:34)!

As the Bible looks ahead to that, it looks like an everlasting honeymoon of Christ and Church; it looks like a permanent wiping away of every tear and healing of every heart; and it looks like: “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man! He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God” (Revelation 21:3) – just as the prophets dreamed. “And they will need no light of lamp or sun, for the Lord God will be their light” in that land of light, “and they will reign forever and ever,” each saint drawn from each nation crowned a king or queen beneath the King of Kings (Revelation 22:5).

Now we anticipate a world that isn't yet so – here, though it exists in its completeness up above already. And as we wait patiently for these dazzling promises, Christ has a word for us: “To the one who conquers,” the disciple who joins the New Joshua in taking possession of the world by the power of self-giving love in the truth, “I will give some of the hidden manna,” the holy food for the holy people, “and I will give him a white stone with a new name written on the stone that no one knows except the one who receives it” (Revelation 2:17). What was true for Abram becoming Abraham, what was true for Sarai becoming Sarah, is true for everyone who conquers, everyone who overcomes, when “the victory that has overcome the world is our faith” (1 John 5:4).

I think I know who I am. You think you know who you are. But we don't yet, just as Abram and Sarai didn't yet know who they really were until God revealed it to them. Our revelation has begun, but only begun. There are new names awaiting us, names spoken by the mouth of the Lord. There's a new purpose, a new identity, on the other side, when we finally take possession of the fullness of the promises of God, when we finally live in the universe as truly our own, when we finally reap the fruits of the eternal covenant of Father and Son, when we sit on the thrones he's prepared for disciples from every nation. In the meantime, what's up to us is to believe in the God who gives life to the dead, to hope against hope in the promises too good to be bored by, to love with the abandon of a berserker at war, to obey our Father's teaching and further our Mother's fertility, and to fall down on the rock, stand forgiven, and walk blamelessly before El Shaddai, God of the Holy Mountain. “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope” (Romans 15:13). Amen.