When Abram got to Canaan, he soon settled down into the life of a ‘stranger and pilgrim’, Heb. 11. 13 – he pitched his tent, built an altar, and called on the name of the Lord, Gen. 12. 6-9. He might have been disappointed to see that the land was then possessed by the Canaanites, v. 6, but it was then that the Lord appeared unto him, and repeated His earlier promise, but now more specifically, ‘Unto thy seed will I give this land’, v. 7. He had made no mistake; it was the right land!
However, Abram’s faith was soon tested, and it was sadly found wanting. In every sense of the word he ‘went down’ into Egypt. There he saw his wife Sarai as a threat to him, rather than the channel for God’s blessing in giving him children. He asked her to tell a half-truth, and say she was his sister, when at most she was his step-sister. Before long his deception was known and he was sent out of Egypt. Of course he could have trusted God, for the logical conclusion of all God’s promises was that he would survive to have children, who would themselves go on for generations.
Although he and his nephew Lot came out of Egypt materially enriched, they were actually spiritually impoverished. Abram had lost his good name and Lot had gained a liking for things in Egypt that would never leave him. Lot’s new riches in terms of cattle soon led to strife between the herdsmen, and Abram very generously offered Lot first choice of a new place. The basis for Lot’s choice seemed to have a good point about it, in that it was ‘even as the garden of the Lord [i.e. Eden]’, but the real reason was that it was ‘like the land of Egypt’, well watered and easy living compared with pilgrim life in the hills.
Lot eventually ended up in Sodom, and was soon caught up in events beyond his control, and was carried off with the other inhabitants. It was only by the intervention of ‘Abram the Hebrew’ that he was set free. Lot never recovered himself spiritually, but Abram went on from strength to strength. Where do we stand? ‘If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him’, 1 John 2. 15.
