(NIV) Genesis 11.27-32 – 27 This is the account of Terah’s family line.

Terah became the father of Abram, Nahor and Haran. And Haran became the father of Lot. 28 While his father Terah was still alive, Haran died in Ur of the Chaldeans, in the land of his birth. 29 Abram and Nahor both married. The name of Abram’s wife was Sarai, and the name of Nahor’s wife was Milkah; she was the daughter of Haran, the father of both Milkah and Iskah. 30 Now Sarai was childless because she was not able to conceive.

31 Terah took his son Abram, his grandson Lot son of Haran, and his daughter-in-law Sarai, the wife of his son Abram, and together they set out from Ur of the Chaldeans to go to Canaan. But when they came to Harran, they settled there. 32 Terah lived 205 years, and he died in Harran.

(NIV) Genesis 12.1-9 – 1The Lord had said to Abram, “Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you.

2 “I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you;
I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.
3 I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse;
and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.”

4 So Abram went, as the Lord had told him; and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he set out from Harran. 5 He took his wife Sarai, his nephew Lot, all the possessions they had accumulated and the people they had acquired in Harran, and they set out for the land of Canaan, and they arrived there.

6 Abram traveled through the land as far as the site of the great tree of Moreh at Shechem. At that time the Canaanites were in the land. 7 The Lord appeared to Abram and said, “To your offspring I will give this land.” So he built an altar there to the Lord, who had appeared to him.

8 From there he went on toward the hills east of Bethel and pitched his tent, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east. There he built an altar to the Lord and called on the name of the Lord.

9 Then Abram set out and continued toward the Negev.

Change 1

Introduction: Path

1. Even when all seems well, we need to be open to change.

2. Hiking with Stephanie on the side of Mount Adams. She chose to stay and sit alongside King's ravine and read. I hiked up the side of Mount Adams. No particular destination as we were staying in a cabin. Went off path to just enjoy this beautiful place. Jumping from rock to rock.

3. Low clouds, almost a fog. Could not see very far. Really did not know where the path was. Few moments of uneasiness. Beautiful yet I needed to find the path to move on. Used map and compass and training to head toward where path most likely was located. Found path.

4. Similar situation here at our church. Great place. Beautiful. If you look close, sense of uneasiness. Can't settle down. Time to move; time to change. Need to be Seeking God's Path.

5. Need to leave "good" for God's "great."

The “Big Idea” – We will always need to be willing to change when we participate with Jesus in the redemption of the world.

A. Motion

God's claim on Abram's life to receive blessings and to be a blessing is set in motion with Abram changing his path.

1. Abram must leave something behind if he is to embrace God's claim on his life. We should note that the introduction to our text, Genesis 11.27-32, offers us some context (background and setting) for God's promise and call of Abram (later called Abraham). The genealogy or family tree in Genesis 11.27– 27 This is the account of Terah’s family line. Terah became the father of Abram, Nahor and Haran connects Abram's family with the Tower of Babel and more important with all the peoples of the earth. Abrah has not come onto the world scene out of the blue. Though this one family. God will reach out to the entire human family. Then we find in Genesis 11.29-30 – 29 ....The name of Abram’s wife was Sarai [later Sarah]....30 Now Sarai was childless because she was not able to conceive. The future of Abram and Sari's family is already in jeopardy.

2. To further this sense of all not being well, we know that the youngest brother Haran has died and the middle brother Nahor seems to be absent. It seems that Abram's father, Terah, at the start takes the initiative. Genesis 11.31-31 – 31 Terah took his son Abram....and his daughter-in-law Sarai....and together they set out from Ur of the Chaldeans to go to Canaan. But when they came to Harran, they settled there. Their journey to Canaan, though, comes to an abrupt stop in Harran. The future is uncertain for this family.

3. Into this uncertainty God speaks. God promises Abram that his descendants will become a nation receiving God's blessings and will be a blessing to the whole human race. We are to understand that God is intent of revealing God's-self to the world through Abraham and Sarah and descendants. God's promised future is set, nothing can stop it. Yet, the shape of that future remains very much in question. God has called Abraham. Genesis 12.1 – 1The Lord had said to Abram, “Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you. God has a promised future for humanity but there still a necessary willingness on the part of Abram to change if he and his family is to participate in God's purposes for the world. Indeed, Abram's faithfulness to God's call will shape God's promised future. Remain settled down in Haran and God will have to find another family to see the promise come to life. Go, and at this point, Abram and Sari know only a general direction with the final destination to be known only when God discloses it. God has called and God has made a promise. Even the promise, though, seems unattainable and distant. Are Abram and Sari willing to trust and to change? Genesis 12.4 – 4 So Abram went, as the Lord had told him.....he set out from Harran....5....and they set out for the land of Canaan, and they arrived there.

B. Trust

For many of us change can be difficult yet change and movement signals our trust in God and our willingness to participation in God's purposes in our world.

{Current "good" to God's "great.'

1. Abraham is willing to change and that, in a real sense, changes the future. You and I know that through Abram and sari's family, and then the people Israel, and then the nation they become comes Messiah Jesus or Jesus the Christ. Abraham and Sarai do not. In fact, knowing that Sarah is not able to have children makes God's promise seem unlikely or even impossible. For his part, Abram and Sari offer a simple trust that God will find away - so they change their plans, move toward Canaan, seeking God's path.

2. Seeking God's Path will undoubtedly mean change for us here at First United Methodist Church of Saint Cloud. Let's face it, we are in a rather good situation at the present. Change will be difficult Financially we are holding our own. There is certainly some active ministry occurring with youth and children, serving the homeless and those who need food and in our small group Bible studies. Our worship services are meaningful and I am ever encouraged by how visitors speak about their experience at our church.

3. In many respects, though, we have settled. God has plans for us to fulfill in "Canaan" but we have settled in "Haran." Now, I am not speaking geographically. Our being settled does not have to do with place but with our purpose. In these next six weeks as we pray and talk and then pray some more, you and I have the opportunity to be seeking God's path for our church. Like Abraham, our changing as God leads us and moving into new areas of ministry signals our trust in God and willingness to participate in God's purposes in our world.

4. Like Abraham, change means giving up comfortable ways of doing church. When God reveals God's path for our church - the three areas of ministry we are asking God to show us - then you and I, (because God has not called "someone" or "them" or "others" to this path), we will need to change. You will need to volunteer and you will need to pray and you will need to give and you will need to do whatever it takes to go and do what God shows us. The truth we must face is the same one Abraham faced - to be obedient and change or to ignore and settle. More important, like Abraham we must decide whether we trust God enough to change so we can participate with God's purposes in our world.

C. Promise

God's blessing and promise have little to do with who we are or our past but with who we might become with God.

1. As difficult as change might be, all good and even great aspects of this life, and more specifically our existence in the life-of-God, come into being through of change. Except for their willingness to change and participate with God's promise, our text offers us no indication of Sari and Abram's previous character and past life experience. "The focus of the narrative is not on who Abram [and Sari] have been but on who they will become."[1] You see, up to this point in the Bible God has cursed humanity for their ever growing, incessant (ceaseless) wickedness: 1) Banished from the Garden of Eden, 2) destroyed in the deluge of the flood and 3) scattered from the Tower of Babel. All to no avail. Sin and evil persists and flourishes. God, though, refuses to give up on the creation and especially on the flesh and blood which still bear a faint reflection of God's image. Something must change.

2. Here, God calls Abram and Sari as the beginning of blessing the creation and humanity. Curse did not bring peace between God and humankind. So, God looks to bring about a fundamental and radical change at the root of our problem. God will offer us the chance to have change our very nature. Through Abram and Sari, God reveals God's love and mercy as well as God's guidance for life. As we know, even this offer of an intimate relationship does not change the problem of our bent toward sinning. Inevitably, God's faithfulness means that in a relationship with humans, God will suffer all the pain and the sorrow that humanity creates and in turn that humanity must endure. The Old Testament story holds out the question, not if, but, when this abiding and relentless faithfulness on God's part will cost God life itself. So, God changes. John 1.14 − 14 The Word [That is God in Jesus] became flesh and made his dwelling among us.

3. During his life on earth, like you and me, Jesus experienced the limitations of being human. In the incarnation, God entered fully into the suffering, pain and injustice as well as the passion, joy and marvel of human life. Through the suffering of Jesus on our behalf, God condemns sin, evil and death, demonstrating God’s fellowship with us and with our fate as sinners.[2] God became what we are so that through a relationship with Jesus Christ we might be restored to the original image of God in which we were created. In limiting himself to know our brokenness, God in Jesus the Christ is able to fully lead us into this change, this being new creations beginning in this life and then continuing in God’s new heaven and new earth at the end of time.

4. Humanity is separated from God by sin and evil. But (remember, when you say "but" after a statement, it negates that statement), God's promise, the blessing begun in part with the call of Abram and Sari, is, 2 Corinthians 5.17 − 17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! There is a promise, this is change and the change is good!

D. Blessing

You and I cannot forget that God's promise to Abram and Sari was not simply that they would be blessed but that they would also be a blessing. This blessing to be a blessing remains fundamental to God's purposes in our world.

1. God calls Aram and Sari to go knowing that God's promise will come to pass, even if they only have a small glimpse of it in their life time. Recall Genesis 12.2-3 –

2 “I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you;
I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.
3 I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse;
and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.”

a. God's promise of us becoming new creations who are reconciled, put to rights, with God through trust in God-in-Jesus comes with the same blessing to be a blessing. 2 Corinthians 5.19b-20a − 19 ....And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. 20 We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us.... We are called to go and to change so that we can participate with God in the redemption, the new creation, in our world!

2. [DID NOT USE: In March of 1993, my friend Tim Carson, then the Youth Pastor of Aloma United Methodist Church, called me one morning to ask if I was interested in taking the position of Summer Youth Intern at the church. Time said, “Mike, I am leaving for seminary so you will be the ‘man’.” I knew this was a great opportunity with possibly even greater benefits yet I also knew moving to Florida brought great risk. Now, I was leaving a secure job where there was a future that seemed appealing to me. Then, I have a very good living arrangement. For a few dollars a month and so long as I cleaned my own dishes, I was living with my Mom and Dad. Their rule was that you could only move home once (unless and emergency arose, and they determine what was an emergency). I had used my “Get Out of Rent Free” cards already. What if this internship did not translate into a full time job? I would be stuck. Big change and big risk. What I found over the next thirteen years is the power of the local church.]

3. The central aspect of the local church is proclaiming the reconciliation with God and then with each other and the creation is possible only through our repentance of sins and faith in the forgiveness and new life we find in Jesus the Christ. This occurs most naturally and effectively in and through the life of the local church - that is you and me here at First United Methodist Church of Saint Cloud - right now! The local church is the hope of the world! Living in the strength of the Holy Spirit, following the God's unique path for its members, the local church is beautiful and powerful. God will bring people to our church who will find healing for broken relationship. New people will become part of our church bringing their unique gifts and personalities to our family. We will offer compassion for those who are sick and hurting. On God's behalf we will challenge unjust social structures. God's kingdom will become visible as we welcome strangers and those who are different. We will see God in offering freedom for the oppressed and providing for the poor. This is the power of the local church!

4. The COMPASS that you have been given is to remind you of the work we are doing over these next seven weeks in SEEKING GOD'S PATH. Yes, a compass can tell you where you are but they are most useful to help you successful move, change, from where you are to new and exacting places. For Sari and Abram God called and the change was good. To experience this good they needed to change, to move and to trust:

Genesis 12.6-9 – 6 Abram traveled through the land as far as the site of the great tree of Moreh at Shechem. At that time the Canaanites were in the land. 7 The Lord appeared to Abram and said, “To your offspring I will give this land.” So he built an altar there to the Lord, who had appeared to him.

8 From there he went on toward the hills east of Bethel and pitched his tent, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east. There he built an altar to the Lord and called on the name of the Lord.

9 Then Abram set out and continued toward the Negev.

a. For you and me, SEEKING GOD'S PATH, God's call on our church and on you and me will be a blessing, it will be good!

“Action Point” – Join us to pray on Thursday night. Important!!!

[1] Bartlett, David Lyon, and Barbara Brown Taylor. "Year A, Vol. 2, Genesis 12:1-4a." In Feasting on the Word Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary. Louisville, Kentucky: Westminster John Knox Pr., 2010.

[2] Wolfhart Pannenberg, Systematic Theology, Vol. 2, 427.