People in
their seventies – and older – still have their health and vitality, for the
most part. (Those of you in this age
range can make approving noises if you want.)
You’ve got more time to travel than you did when you were employed. Most of you have more financial resources to
travel than you did when you had children at home. And for some, it may even be a deliberate
decision to do some skiing. (Skiing as
in the acronym S-K-I, which stands for “Spending the Kids’ Inheritance”.)
And, to tell
the truth, you’re probably a lot more mentally adventurous, much more
culturally tolerant, and generally far less conservative now than you were in
your thirties and forties. You probably
even find yourself much more mentally adventurous, more culturally tolerant,
and generally less conservative than many of the younger people you know.
And this is
the case with older people around the world.
If the 1960s were a great time to be young, the twenty-teens are a great
time to be old. For a person in their seventies
or older to embark on a great adventure is not all that spectacular these days.
It’s become the done thing.
This was not
the case in Abram’s day. In those days,
old was old. Abram was seventy-five and
his wife Sarai was close to it. They
weren’t expected to go chasing off into the desert at the command of some
new-fangled Big-G God. They were
expected to ease into their dotage in the safe, old-fashioned way, worshipping
their full quota of petty little small-g gods, just as their parents did ...
and their parents before them ... and their parents before them ... and so on.
The
neighbours probably shook their heads in a combination of amusement and
annoyance. “He’s doing what?
... Travelling across the desert?
... At his age? ... Surely Sarai will talk some sense into
him. ... What? She’s
going too? ... Both of them should act
their age! ... I told you no good would ever come out of this one-God business. ... What are the old people coming to these
days? ...” ... and so on.
And so, as
Abraham and Sarai, the world’s first monotheists, left their hometown of Haran
... with their nephew ... and their servants ... and their animals ... and
their household goods ..., they must have heard the sarcastic comments of their
neighbours.
But somehow,
it was in this event, when Abram and Sarai left the comforts of home in service
to finding God’s future for them and for the world, that we see a key moment in
the religious and ethical development of humanity. For three great faiths: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam – each
traces its heritage back to Abram’s desert journey into the unknown.
This is
appropriate. A few chapters before
today’s lesson from Genesis, God told Abram, just before he and his family set
off: “... in you shall all the families
of the earth be blessed.” And, in a real
sense, this has been the case. In the
three Abrahamic faith traditions, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, whatever
their differences, there are some profound common themes:
·
One God who is
love at the very heart of God’s being;· One God, whose love is extended to all humanity;
· One God, who calls all people to practice justice, peace, and mercy;
· One God, whom we worship through our ethical deeds as much as in our religious activities.
For his role
in introducing humanity to this One God, “...all the families of the earth ...
[were surely] ... blessed” by Abram’s journey into the unknown.
And so, in
the simple reality of an old couple who challenged the expectations of their
culture, we see a source of profound hope for all people, for “all the families
of the earth”.
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