Listen to Devotion

The LORD had said to Abram, “…and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.”

Let’s imagine the life of Abram—this famous figure from the Bible. In our imagination, it’s easy to presume God is coming down every other day to perform a dramatic miracle. It’s easy to picture Abram living a life bursting with high drama, a John Williams soundtrack swelling in the background. And because you and I already know how everything turns out, it’s easy to suppose that, somehow, Abram does too.

These presumptions, of course, are wrong. Ninety-nine percent of Abram’s life had no high drama at all. It was mundane, ordinary, filled with problems, filled with headaches—those made by others and those of his own making—filled with the logistics of finding food and water for his flocks and herds, filled with the complications of caring for his not-always-happy family. And Abram did not have a crystal-clear vision on how everything was going to turn out.

All he had was a promise. The Lord promised to bless him. The Lord promised to take care of him. The Lord promised to do wonderful things through him. And most of all, the Lord promised that, through Abram, he would bring the Savior into the world.

And that was it. That’s what Abram had. Throughout his most ordinary life, Abram possessed an extraordinary promise from God.

With few exceptions, our lives are not lives of high drama. The London Symphony does not follow us around playing a movie score. Our lives contain much that is mundane, ordinary, filled with trouble, bouts of pain, and unresolved problems that need our management. It’s part of living in a broken world—a world broken by your sin and mine.

And all we have is a promise. A promise that the Lord will bless. A promise that the Lord will take care of us. A promise that the Lord will do wonderful things through us.

But here’s the thing. Such a promise is more than enough. It’s more than enough because it’s a promise sealed in the blood of Jesus Christ, the very blood that has washed our sins away.

Lord Jesus, when the mundane problems of my life overwhelm me, remind me of the extraordinary promise I possess in you. Amen.

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All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc. ™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.