Genesis 15:1-12, 17-18
This is a strange story that comes in a very interesting part of the narrative. Abraham is still Abram, meaning that God hasn’t gone through the great renaming ceremony. After the promise we read about this week—that Abram will have descendants as numerous as the stars—Sarai comes up with the plan to have her husband father a child by Hagar. And after that debacle, God has to remind Abram of the promise that he will indeed have offspring.
Inside the story there is some strange stuff happening. There’s cut up animals and this weird floating fire pot and torch for one. The lectionary, however, decides to make things more complicated by cutting out an important piece of the story. Verse twelve closes by telling us that Abram falls asleep and what could be a called “a terror of great darkness” falls upon him. If we’d gotten to read verse thirteen perhaps things would make more sense. “Know, you will because your seed will a stranger in a land not theirs. And they will serve and answer them four hundred years.” Basically God says, you will have offspring as numerous as the stars who will inherit this land, but for almost half-a-century, they will be slaves in a foreign land. Gee, thanks.
There’s a scene in Prince Caspian where Lucy encounters the lion Aslan. Slowly she comes to realize that all the hard work ahead belongs to her and her siblings. Aslan is not just going to come “bounding in and make everything all right.” Rather, lion offers hope—hope that things will be redeemed.
Yes, Abram’s offspring—the Children of Israel—would inherit the land promised to them. But there were many hard years that came between. Not everyone saw redemption, but all were asked to live with the hope of it.
As we go deeper into the Lenten season, we are asked to reflect on our own lives and find where redemption seems far off. For some, redemption would be a job to end the long period of unemployment. For others, a long illness for themselves or a loved one makes restoration or death seem like a redemption that is far off. For some of us, four hundred years would be fine, just as long as we knew when we would wake and find that our redemption draws nigh.
Occasionally the “terror of great darkness” falls upon us, and we feel that we cannot rise even to face the day. And the only news that comes is that there is four hundred years of this ahead. Yet even in those times there is hope. There is the hope that after even the darkest of nights, though it seems impossible, the tomb will be empty.
God of promises and tomorrows, help us as we struggle to see the hope in the darkness. Be near us when the terror of that darkness falls.