Stay, Just A Little Longer 3/10/2015

Good Morning,

I hope your day is easy come and easy go. I am starting this fine morning with a cup of Door County Highlander Grog Coffee. Some people wake up to smell the roses. My nose leads me to the coffee pot.

Genesis 18:1-5, 16-22 New King James Version (NKJV)

18 Then the Lord appeared to him by the terebinth trees of Mamre, as he was sitting in the tent door in the heat of the day. ² So he lifted his eyes and looked, and behold, three men were standing by him; and when he saw them, he ran from the tent door to meet them, and bowed himself to the ground, ³ and said, “My Lord, if I have now found favor in Your sight, do not pass on by Your servant. ⁴ Please let a little water be brought, and wash your feet, and rest yourselves under the tree. ⁵ And I will bring a morsel of bread, that you may refresh your hearts. After that you may pass by, inasmuch as you have come to your servant.”

 

¹⁶ Then the men rose from there and looked toward Sodom, and Abraham went with them to send them on the way. ¹⁷ And the Lord said, “Shall I hide from Abraham what I am doing, ¹⁸ since Abraham shall surely become a great and mighty nation, and all the nations of the earth shall be blessed in him? ¹⁹ For I have known him, in order that he may command his children and his household after him, that they keep the way of the Lord, to do righteousness and justice, that the Lord may bring to Abraham what He has spoken to him.” ²⁰ And the Lord said, “Because the outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is great, and because their sin is very grave, ²¹ I will go down now and see whether they have done altogether according to the outcry against it that has come to Me; and if not, I will know.”
²² Then the men turned away from there and went toward Sodom, but Abraham still stood before the Lord.

 

 

In our text today we see that God pays Abraham a visit. we are specifically told in Gen. 18:1 that the Lord (YHWH) appeared to him (Abraham) near the trees/oaks of Mamre.  The Hebrew makes it perfectly clear that Yahweh himself appeared, at least at some point in the story. The Greek translators confirm, albeit somewhat more generically, that it was God (ho theos) that appeared.

After these words of introduction, we are told that Abraham, while sitting in his tent, looks up and beheld three “men” approaching. Neither the Hebrew nor the Greek call them “angels” here, but use common words for mortal men.  However, in the next chapter, Gen. 19:1, two of the “men” are called angels (or “messengers”, in both Hebrew and Greek). If two of them leave for Sodom, then apparently the third is left behind. The way the narrative comes to us, the third visitor would seem to be the Lord, who is left by the other two and remains speaking to Abraham in the last part of chapter 18.

 

What has always intrigued me was how comfortable Abraham was with God. Abraham knew that he was in the presence of God and opened his home asking God to stay on longer. I wonder how many of us put a limit on our time with God and how many of us would ask to have more time with Him? Are our homes open to spending time with God? Makes you wonder how people can easily miss church without batting an eye. Abraham clearly let God know that He appreciated the visit and wanted more.  I wonder if we all do that?

 

Time to go to work now. Think this one through.

 

Marty