Hebrews 6:13-15

Summary retelling of Hebrews 6:13-15

We are reminded of God’s promise to Abraham.  God made this oath according to His own righteousness.  God told Abraham that he would be blessed and multiplied.  Abraham obtained the promise through His patient waiting.

Thoughts for Today

First Thought:

Isn’t it interesting that we are reminded here that God makes promises?  In fact, God made all kinds of promises.  The neat question is why God makes those promises.  Human beings make promises largely for selfish reasons.  We get caught, so we promise to change.  We want someone to like us, so we promise to do something for them.  Many – but certainly not all – of the promises we make are inherently self-centered.  Not so with God.  God doesn’t need us or need anything from us.  God makes promises to us in order to improve our existence.  God makes promises to us in order to make us more like Him so that our life together would be better than it is.

What promises have you made recently?  Why did you make those promises?  What promises has God made to you?  Why did God make those promises?

Second Thought:

Specifically in this reading we hear the promise that God would take Abraham and multiply his offspring.  In other words, God was going to turn a single person into a great nation.  God is telling Abraham that He desires to create a people who are faithful to Him as Abraham was faithful.  Now certainly Abraham was not perfect.  Abraham made his fair share of mistakes.  However, God’s promise was not based upon Abraham’s perfection.  God’s promise was based on God’s perfection.

In spite of Abraham’s mistakes, did God fulfill His promise to Abraham?  In spite of your mistakes, can God fulfill His promise to you?

Third Thought:

The one quality that the author lifts up about Abraham is patience.  Abraham did not have his offspring immediately after God promised it to Him.  In fact, Abraham had to wait until he was an old man.  Abraham even tried to bring about God’s promise on his own – a great mistake.  So as we said earlier, Abraham wasn’t perfect in his waiting, either.  But eventually the promise came true.  Abraham did have his offspring.  Many generations later that offspring had indeed multiplied into a nation.  Many, many generations later a savior of the world was born out of that nation and a new spiritual family was created.  God’s promise to Abraham required much patience to see fulfilled.

How patient are you?  How patient are your spiritual mentors?  Why is it that human beings tend to be weak with respect to being patient?

Passage for Tomorrow: Hebrews 6:16-18