The Bible in a Year (with Fr. Mike Schmitz) - Day 7: God's Covenant with Abram (2024)

Episode Date: January 7, 2024

Fr. Mike talks about the significance of God's covenant with Abram, and how it points to God's immense love for us. Today's readings are Genesis 14-15, Job 3-4, and Proverbs 1:8-19. For the complete reading plan, visit ascensionpress.com/bibleinayear. Please note: The Bible contains adult themes that may not be suitable for children - parental discretion is advised.

Hi, I'm Father Mike Schmitz, and you're listening to the Bible in a Year podcast, where we encounter God's voice and live life through the lens of Scripture. The Bible in a Year podcast is brought to you by Ascension. Using the Great Adventure Bible timeline, we'll read all the way from Genesis to Revelation, discovering how the story of salvation unfolds and how we fit into that story today. This is day seven, and we are reading from Genesis chapter 14 and chapter 15. We're continuing the story of Abram and Sarai and their call. We're also taking those next steps in the story of the life of the righteous man,

suffering man, Job, by reading Job chapter three and chapter four. We're also diving more deeply into the wisdom literature by doing a number of verses in Proverbs chapter 1, verses 8 through 19. Quick reminder, the Bible translation that I'm using is the Revised Standard Version, Catholic edition. It's the Great Adventure Bible from Ascension. And also, you can track us and track how far you're coming and track where you're headed by downloading your Bible in a Year reading plan by visiting ascensionpress.com slash Bible in a Year. You can subscribe in the podcast app, and that way you don't have to even think about it. It just pops up every morning for you, so you can listen to the Word of God proclaimed.

You can also sign up for our email list and get notifications and all those kinds of things by texting CatholicBible to 33777. Just join that by texting the word CatholicBible to 33777. Let's keep going and let's get started. Genesis chapter 14 and chapter 15. In the days of Amraphel, king of Shinar, Ariok, king of Elessar, Jedorlamer, king of Elam, and Tidal king of Goim, these kings made war with Bera, king of Sodom, Bersha, king of Gomorrah, Sh king of Adma, Shemiber king of Zeboim, and the king of Bela, that is, Zoar. And all these joined forces in the valley of Sedim, that is, the salt sea. Twelve years they had served Jedro-Leomer, but in the thirteenth year they rebelled.

In the fourteenth year, Jedro-Leomer and the kings who were with him came and subdued the Rephaim in Ashteroth, Karnaim, the Zuzim in Ham, the Emim in Sheva Kiriathim, and the Horites in the Mount Seir as far as El-Paran on the border of the wilderness. Then they turned back and came to Enmishbat, that is Kadesh, and subdued all the country of the Malachites and also the Amorites who dwelt in Hazazon Tamar. Then the king of Sodom, the king of Gomorrah, the king of Adma, the king of Zeboim, and the king of Betla, that is Zoar, went out, and they joined battle in the valley of Siddim with Chedorlaomer, king of Alam, titled king of Goim, Amraphal, king of Shinar, and Ariok, king of Elessar, four kings against five. Now the valley of Siddim was full of bitumen pits. And as the kings of

Sodom and Gomorrah fled, some fell into them and the rest fled to the mountain. So the enemy took all the goods of Sodom and Gomorrah and all their provisions and went their way. They also took Lot, the son of Abram's brother, who dwelt in Sodom and his goods and departed. Then one who had escaped came and told Abram the Hebrew, who was living by the oaks of Mamre, the Amorite, brother of Eshol and of Aner. These were allies of Abram. When Abram heard that his kinsmen had been taken captive, he led forth his trained men, born in his house, 318 of them, and went in pursuit as far as Dan. And he divided his forces against them by night, he and his servants, and routed

them and pursued them to Hobah, north of Damascus. Then he brought back all the goods, and also brought back his kinsmen Lot with his goods, and the women, and the people. After this, he returned from the defeat of Chedorlaomer and the kings who were with him. The king of Sodom went out to meet him at the valley of Shavah, that is, the king's valley, and Melchizedek, king of Salem, brought out bread and wine. He was priest of God Most High, and he blessed him and said, Blessed be Abram by God Most High, maker of heaven and earth, and blessed be God Most High, who has delivered your enemies into your hand. And Abram gave him a tenth of everything. And the king of Sodom said to Abram,

Give me the persons, but take the goods for yourself. But Abram said to the king of Sodom, I have sworn to the Lord God Most High, maker of heaven and earth, that I would not take a thread or a sandal thong or anything that is yours, lest you should say, I have made Abram rich. I will take nothing but what the young men have eaten

and the share of the men who went with me. Let Aner, Eshol, and Mamre take their share. After these things, the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision. Fear not, Abram, I am your shield. Your reward will be very great. But Abram said, O Lord God, what will you give me? For I continue childless, and the heir of my house is Eleazar of Damascus. And Abram said, Behold, you have given me no offspring, and a slave born in my house will be my heir. And behold, the word of the Lord came to him, This man shall not be your heir, your own son shall be your heir. And he brought him outside and said, Look toward heaven, and number the stars if you are able to number them. Then he said to him, So shall your descendants be. And he believed the Lord, and he reckoned it to him as righteousness. And he said to him, I am the Lord who brought you out from Ur of the Chaldeans, to give you this land to possess. But he said, O Lord God, how am I to

know that I shall possess it? He said to him, Bring me a heifer three years old, a she-goat three years old, a ram three years old, a turtle dove, and a young pigeon. And he brought him all these, cut them in two, and laid each half over against the other, but he did not cut the birds in two. And when birds of prey came down upon the carcasses, Abram drove them away. As the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell on Abram, and behold, a dread and great darkness fell upon him. Then the Lord said to Abram, Know of a surety that your descendants will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs, and will be slaves there, and they will be oppressed for four hundred

years. But I will bring judgment on the nation which they serve, and will be slaves there, and they will be oppressed for four hundred years. But I will bring judgment on the nation which they serve, and afterward they shall come out with great possessions. As for yourself, you shall go to your fathers in peace. You shall be buried in a good old age, and they shall come back here in the fourth generation, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete. And when the sun had gone down, and it was dark, behold, a smoking fire pot and a flaming torch passed between these pieces. On that day, the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying, To your descendants I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates, the land of the Kenites, the Kenizzites, the Kadamites, and the Hittites,

the Perizzites, the Rephaim, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites, and the Jebusites. Job chapter 3 and chapter 4. After this, Job opened his mouth and cursed the day of his birth. And Job said, let the day perish wherein I was born. And the night which said a man child is conceived, let that day be darkness. May God above not seek it, nor light shine upon it. Let gloom and deep darkness claim it. Let clouds dwell upon it. Let the blackness of the day terrify it. That night, let thick darkness seize it. Let it not rejoice among the days of the year. Let it not come into the number of the months. Yes, let that night be barren. Let no joyful cry be heard in it. Let those curse it who curse the day, who are skilled to rouse up Leviathan. Let the stars

of its dawn be dark. Let it hope for light but have none, nor see the eyelids of the morning, because it did not shut the doors of my mother's womb, nor hide trouble from my eyes. Why did I not die at birth, come forth from the womb and expire? Why did the knees receive me, or why the breasts that I should suck for then I should have laid down and been quiet I should have slept then I should have been at rest with kings and counselors of the earth who rebuilt ruins for themselves or with princes who had gold who filled their houses with silver or why was I not as a hidden untimely birth as infants that never see the light. There the wicked cease from troubling, and there the weary are at rest. There the prisoners are at ease together, they hear not the voice of the taskmaster.

The small and the great are there, and the slave is free from his master. Why is light given to him who is in misery, and life to the bitter in soul, who long for death but it comes not, and life to the bitter in soul, who long for death but it comes not, and dig for it more than for hidden treasures, who rejoice exceedingly and are glad when they find a grave? Why is light given to a man whose way is hidden, whom God has hedged in? For my sighing comes as my bread, and my groanings are poured out like water. For the thing that I fear comes upon me,

and what I dread befalls me. I am not at ease, nor am I quiet. I have no rest, but trouble comes. Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered, If one ventures a word with you, will you be offended? Yet who can keep from speaking? Behold, you have instructed many, and you have strengthened the weak hands. Your words have upheld him who was stumbling, and you have made firm the feeble knees. But now it has come to you, and you are impatient. It touches you, and you're dismayed. Is not your fear of God your confidence, and the integrity of your ways your hope? Think now, who that was innocent ever perished, or where were the upright cut off? As I have seen, those who plow iniquity and sow trouble reap the same. By the breath of God they perish, and by the blast of his anger they are consumed.

The roar of the lion, the voice of the fierce lion, the teeth of the young lions are broken. The strong lion perishes for lack of prey, and the whelps of the lioness are scattered. Now a word was brought to me stealthily. My ear received the whisper of it. Amid thoughts from visions of the night, when deep sleep falls on men, dread came upon me in trembling, which made all my bones shake. A spirit glided past my face. The hair of my flesh stood up. It stood still, but I could not discern its appearance. A form wasided past my face. The hair of my flesh stood up. It stood still, but I could not discern its appearance. A form was before my eyes. There was silence. Then I heard a voice. Can mortal man be righteous before God? Can a man be pure before his maker?

Even in his servants he puts no trust, and his angels he charges with error. How much more those who dwell in houses of clay, whose foundation is in the dust, who are crushed before the moth? Between morning and evening they are destroyed, they perish forever without any regarding it. If their tent cord is plucked up within them, do they not die, and that without wisdom? Reading from the book of Proverbs, chapter 1, verses 8 through 19. My son, if sinners entice you, do not consent. If they say, come with us, let us lie in wait for blood, let us wantonly ambush the innocent. Like Sheol, let us swallow them alive,

and whole, like those who go down to the pit. We shall find all precious goods. We shall fill our houses with spoil. Throw in your lot among us. We will all have one purse. My son, do not walk in the way with them. Hold back your foot from their paths, for their feet run to evil, and they make haste to shed blood. For in vain is a net spread in the sight of any bird, but these men lie in wait for their own blood. They set an ambush for their own lives. Such are the ways of all who get gained by violence.

It takes away the life of its possessors. Father in heaven, thank you so much for bringing us here. Thank you for speaking your word to us. Thank you for revealing your heart to us as you do whenever we pick up your word, whenever we hear your word proclaimed, whenever we hear your word proclaimed, whenever we read your word. Lord, you enlighten our minds and enlighten our eyes. You give fire to our hearts and you show us how to love. Help us to trust you this day and every day. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Okay, wow, so there's so much. You guys, gosh, there is so much happening. Not only do we have this incredible couple of stories of Abram, we'll be here. We heard Abram

joined the kings, the battle of the kings, and he ultimately ended up on a rescue mission with his men to save his nephew Lot. And then what happens? There is this priest king, the king of Salem, Melchizedek, who blesses him and offers up bread and wine on a high place. It's just, it's remarkable. You know that later on, Jesus will be described as having a priesthood according to the order of Melchizedek. Because why? Well, there's many, many reasons. But one of the reasons is because Jesus doesn't pass away. It's not an inherited priesthood. He is the great high priest of all time. And so he's like Melchizedek, who has neither a beginning nor end, as scripture later on says. But also you have this incredible gift of the priest king who offers up a sacrifice

of bread and wine. And as we know, later on, Jesus will offer up the sacrifice of bread and wine, which is truly his body and his blood. And at every mass, priests who are united to the great high priest Jesus offer up the sacrifice of his body and blood, bread and wine. It is remarkable. But we're also getting closer and closer to Abram's name changing to become Abraham. Not yet, but we're getting close. And we also saw this incredible covenant that the Lord God made with Abram's name be changing to become Abraham. Not yet, but we're getting close. And we also saw this incredible covenant that the Lord God made with Abram. What does he do? He gets three-year-old ram, three-year-old heifer, three-year-old she-goat, turtle dove, young pigeon, and he splits

the animals, not the birds, but splits the animals in two, makes a pathway between the two of them. This is how you would forge a covenant in the ancient world. You would make a path between the halves of these animals and you would walk through the parts, basically walk through the blood and the guts that was in there, essentially saying, if I am false to this covenant, if I'm false to what I'm about to do, then let me be as these animals. And here is Abram and he's waiting there and God himself passes through that. And this is, which is remarkable, just blows the mind to realize that here is God who placing himself on the line, saying to Abram, all the things I promised you, I promised you a family. I've promised you land.

I promised that the world will be blessed through you, that I will be faithful to this covenant. And the Lord God passes through those pieces. You might have noticed that Abram did not pass through the pieces. And I've heard people talk about this and describe that this is the mercy of God, as he knows that human beings, I mean, Genesis chapter 1 through chapter 11 are all about how broken we are, right? It's all about the fall and all about how just we continually, we continually stumble.

And so here is Genesis, you is Genesis 12 and following that we're reading now. And what we have is God himself passing through the pieces, essentially saying, I know you're going to be false to this covenant. And so even your failure, I take on me. And that's what he does in the person of Jesus. The Lord God himself takes our wounds, takes our failings, takes our sins on himself, which is just, ah, praise the Lord God himself for this. And lastly, we had still, you know, we have the book of Job and what we're going to find is we have Job who, um, he's kind of gotten to his end, right? And so yesterday he was saying, I'm going to still worship God. I'm still going to trust God. And today he, you know,

opened up his heart and he said, actually, I wish I was never born. And he goes on this whole long speech about how it would have been better for him if he had died, even in his mother's womb. And then his friend, he has the three friends, you know, remember they, they sat with him for seven days and seven nights, and now they're going to speak. And what we heard that first friend say, Eliphaz, what he was describing was a worldview that says that, no, all suffering is a result of sin. So Job, listen, God is never unfaithful. God is never unjust, which is true. But then he makes the point, and he's going to say this tomorrow as well, that all suffering is a result of sin. Now, we know that that's not true. We know that suffering is a result of sin, but not all suffering is a result of sin.

Some suffering is a result of the fact that we live in a broken world. We're going to find out later on why did God allow Satan to stretch forth his hand and strike Job down? Because that seems so unfair. It seems so cruel. In fact, not just unfair, it seems almost reckless and mean of God, where here's the one person who is faithful to God. And so God says, yeah, Satan, you can have him. What is going on there? We're going to unpack that as we journey forth the next couple of days.

Know this though, know this, that the Lord is not fair. The Lord loves Job and the Lord loves you. This is so key as we walk through the book of Job. And as we walk through this entire Bible, this is God's love letter to you, which is why we're proclaiming it to you in your ears. This is why we want you to know that you can please join us every single day as we continue to travel throughout the course of this year with this Bible in your podcast. Man, what a gift. What a gift to know that God loves you and God is speaking to you.

Even when we don't know what he's talking about, even in the midst of brokenness and real suffering and confusion, we know that he wants us to know him. That's how much he loves us. Once again, if you're interested in downloading your own Bible in a year reading plan, please visit ascensionpress.com slash Bible in a year. You can subscribe in your podcast app and get the updates daily. And you can also sign up for our email list by texting the word Catholic Bible, all one word Catholic Bible to the number 33777. Again,

Catholic Bible to the number 33777. Man, what a gift. My name is Father Mike. God bless.