New Park Street Pulpit · Sermon No. 261
Delivered on Sabbath Morning, July 10th, 1859.
“By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went.”—Hebrews 11:8.
ABRAHAM’S FAITH was of the most eminent order, for he is called the Father of the Faithful. Let us rest assured that nothing but repeated and fiery trials could have trained his faith to so great a strength as that which it exhibited in his preparation to slay his son at the command of God. This true Jerusalem blade was long annealed before it gained its marvellous edge and matchless temper. Men come not to their perfect stature except by years of growth. Stars cannot reach the zenith of the heavens by one sudden flash, nay even the sun himself must climb to his meridian. Trials are the winds which root the tree of our faith. They are the trainers, drilling God’s young soldiers, and teaching their hands to war and their fingers to fight. Foremost among Abraham’s trials was that of being called away to a land which he had never been; as this may be our trial also, I pray that my words may be adapted to our present condition.
I. First, let us LOOK AT ABRAHAM. Abraham’s family was originally an idolatrous one; afterwards some beams of light shone in upon the household, and they became worshippers of the true God; but there was much ignorance mingled with their worship, and at least occasionally their old idolatrous habits returned. The Lord who had always fixed on Abraham to be his chosen servant and the father of his chosen people upon earth, made Abraham leave the society of his friends and relatives, and go out of Ur of the Chaldees, and journey away to the land of Canaan, which be had promised afterwards to give him for an inheritance.
We shall notice first what Abraham left, and then where Abraham went; the trial is made up of these two things. What had he to leave? He had to leave behind him those who were exceeding dear to him. It is true that just after his first call, his own father, Terah, died, having gone a part of the way with Abraham and detained Abraham a little while by sickness. Abraham then went on his way obedient to the Lord’s command. Nevertheless, he left behind him all the associationof his youth, the house in which he had been trained, the family with which he had been nursed, all those whom he had known and with whom he had taken sweet counsel; and he must go forth into exile from the family of his love. He left behind him his native country, and to a patriot that is no small struggle—to leave all the associations of one’s country, and bear with us one’s native songs to be sung in distant valleys. Many a man has felt keenly enough the separation from home and kindred, and next to that, the sad banishment from his native land. Besides, we all know with what inconvenience Abraham must have removed. He had a considerable property in flocks and herds, and probably had the ancestral dwelling house in which to reside. He must leave all these, and he must also leave the fair pastures wherein his flocks and his father’s flocks had been fed, and he must wend his way into the wilderness. He must give up all agricultural pursuits, renounce his vine and his fig tree, and go his way, he knew not whither, to a land which to him was as unknown as the valley of the shadow of death. Whose of you who have had to part from those you loved, who have had your hearts rent when loved ones have been torn away, can sympathize somewhat with Abraham’s trial when he left home and family, and country, and all, to go forth into an unknown land. This is the place from which he went.
How, let us turn to the place to which he journeyed. When men emigrate, they, wish to know the nature of the country in which they are to live. If it be a richer country than their own, although it be with some reluctance, they spread the sail and speed across the waters; and it may be, after they have settled there a little while, their mother country is almost forgotten, and they find a settled dwelling-place in their adopted land. But Abraham knew nothing of the country to which he was about to move; be had simply God’s promise that it should be his inheritance. It was, it might be said, a wild goose chase, and the profane would deride it as a mad and idle dream. Doubtless, the prudent father cautioned him to avoid so great a risk, and the anxious mother bade him remember that, as a bird wandereth from his nest, so is he that leaveth his place. But amidst all this, Abraham was wiser than the wisest, for he put aside all worldly maxims, he set the precept above the maxim, and considered the promise more precious than the proverb. Well was it for Abraham that he knew that the wise things of men are often ignorance dressed out in its best clothes. It has been said by an acute old writer, that when Christ came into Jerusalem—and he was incarnate wisdom—he came riding upon an ass; but when Satan came into paradise—and he is infernal folly—he came in the shape of a wise creature, the subtle serpent. Wisdom came riding upon stupidity, and folly came in the garments of craftiness; We shall often find it so in our lives. Simplicities are next akin to revelations. Plain simple things, and especially a plain simple obedience, are next akin to the very wisdom of the seer; and he who knoweth how to read the precept need not be afraid that the prophecy will ever contradict it, or render obedience to the precept an act of folly. Abraham then went forth, he knew not whither. “The journey is a long one,” say some timid ones. “It is so,” said Abraham, “but God will help me on the way.” “The end of your journey may be doleful,” they say. “No,” caith Abraham, “it cannot be doleful; it may be disappointing to my worldly ambition, but not to my faith. I believe that God will be with me, and that take me where he may, I shall lack no good thing.” So Abraham went on his way along alone and weary journey, and God did not desert him, but graciously provided for him.