By Steve Horn Abraham’s story in Genesis 12 is a model story of what it means to take God at His word and obey. I have always been amazed at Abram’s faith depicted in this account. As I have often summarized about this story, “God said to Abram ‘Get up and go,’ and Abram got up and went.” The part of the story that I want to isolate today is not Abram’s journey to the land of Canaan, but instead what he did when he got there. He built an altar. In fact in Abram’s case, we see a series of altars. In chapter 12, we have two initial altars. • 7 Then the LORD appeared to Abram and said, “I will give this land to your offspring.” So he built an altar there to the LORD who had appeared to him. • 8 From there he moved on to the hill country east of Bethel and pitched his tent, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east. He built an altar to Yahweh there, and he called on the name of Yahweh. In chapter 13, we see the indication of additional altars. The first is the return to the altar between Bethel and Ai. • Then Abram went up from Egypt to the Negev—he, his wife, and all he had, and Lot with him. Abram was very rich in livestock, silver, and gold. He went by stages from the Negev to Bethel, to the place between … [Read more...]