In this episode, I will use the story of Abram in Genesis 12 to provide biblical support for the claim that faith never has all the answers. Truly, what I do not mean by that statement is that faith is blind, uninformed, or unreasonable, or that faith has reason to doubt. Biblical faith is always certain about God, His Word, and His trustworthiness. After all, our faith is real and legitimate because of its object, Christ, who is eternal and does not change. Faith is, however, seldom certain about things. Never having all the answers does not mean that you are in some way deficient or intellectually impaired; rather, it means you are humble enough to know that you are not God, and thus, you will never have all the answers. In fact, if you knew everything, then you would be God and wouldn’t need faith. Faith is thus the most reasonable response to the Lord because you are trusting in One who is omniscient. As Oswald Chambers once wrote:
“Faith never knows where it is being led, but it loves and knows the One who is leading.”
As I often do, I will take the long way around to reach the conclusion that faith never has all the answers. As stated, we will focus on the Abrahamic covenant in Genesis 12, but before we begin there, let’s set the stage in Genesis 6, where we are introduced to Noah for the first time.
Noah both found favor in the eyes of the Lord (Genesis 6:8) and was labeled as a righteous man who was blameless in his time (6:9). In fact, after he and his family exit the Ark, the first thing Noah does is build an altar and offer a burnt sacrifice to God (8:20). What then happens to the legacy of the faithful? The Bible speaks of the Lord as the God of Shem (9:26), one of Noah’s three sons. But after Shem, there is deafening silence. That is, in Shem’s family tree (10:22–31), no believers are mentioned. Fathers have sons who have sons, but the Bible says neither that any of those men called upon the name of the Lord nor that they were righteous. But, ten generations after Noah, we get to Abram. In between Shem and Abram, the text would seem to suggest that all of humanity forgot about God; yet, God did not forget about His promise to raise up a seed of the woman who would crush the serpent’s head (Genesis 3:15).
This brings us to Genesis 12:1–3, which lays the foundation for what will become the Abrahamic covenant. The covenant will be officially ratified with a visible sign and seal in chapters 15 and 17. But in Genesis 12, the Lord starts by giving Abram promises of a good land, a great nation, and a great name. Of course, Abram would receive a tremendous blessing, but ultimately this blessing would be for all the families of the world (Genesis 12:3). Genesis 12:1–5 says:
Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go forth from your country, and from your relatives and from your father’s house, to the land which I will show you; and I will make you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great; and so you shall be a blessing; and I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse. And in you all the families of the earth will be blessed.”
So Abram went forth as the Lord had spoken to him; and Lot went with him. Now Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran. Abram took Sarai his wife and Lot his nephew, and all their possessions which they had accumulated, and the persons which they had acquired in Haran, and they set out for the land of Canaan; thus they came to the land of Canaan.
The first thing to notice here is that God did not find a “good guy” who was doing all the right things. The Lord wasn’t found by a man who was searching for Him. In fact, Joshua 24:2 tells us that Abram and his father (Terah) were idolaters and served other gods. This is consistent with Shem’s genealogy in chapter 10, where up until this point, faith was silent. But then what happens? God calls Abram. God is the one who initiates a relationship and engages with the one who has no faith. Genesis 12:1 says:
Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go forth from your country, and from your relatives and from your father’s house, to the land which I will show you …”
You see, in the same way that God made creation out of nothing with His Word, God now calls Abram with His Word, which creates faith where there was none. After all, why would a pagan listen to a God he doesn’t believe in? He wouldn’t. Unless a Word from the One true God changed that man in a way that causes him to positively respond to the call. Abram didn’t have a choice in the matter, because when a sovereign God effectually calls a person, His Word will not return to Him void (Isaiah 55:11). There are some people who say that the same grace that causes faith is resistible by human beings. That is to say, a mere creature can resist the power of an Almighty God. If that sounds ridiculous, that’s because it is. To suggest that divine grace is resistible would be like saying that a newborn could beat an elite bodybuilder in an arm-wrestling match. The biblical reality is, when a sovereign God effectually calls a person, that grace is irresistible (John 6:37, 44; Romans 8:29–30; Acts 13:48, 16:14; Ephesians 2:8–9; II Timothy 1:9). When Jesus called out to Lazarus in the tomb, the corpse had no choice but to rise.
What is evident then, is that God’s summoning of Abram to go went much deeper than simply packing up his belongings and moving. God was telling Abram to flee his idolatry by leaving the pagan-saturated land in which he was dwelling and to depart from his familial culture that actively encouraged false worship. Abram must let go of one thing to hold onto another, and the pressure of God’s call to go builds over three verses.
God calls Abram to leave his land, which means he must let go of his home, a place that is familiar. God calls Abram to leave his family, which means sacrificing relationships, security, and culture. And, if we draw from historical content, leaving one’s family in Abram’s time also meant turning one’s back on the family name and forsaking one’s inheritance. In a time when families (which were extended) stayed together for the purposes of loyalty and security, getting up and leaving could mean Abram was regarded as a traitor. God’s call means letting go of all the comforts Abram has ever known.
But what does Abram stand to gain? Far more than he gives up. God says:
Go … to the land which I will show you; and I will make you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great.
God essentially promises Abram land and a people. Abram would lose Haran but gain Canaan; a childless 75-year-old would leave his family but gain a spiritual legacy that would last forever. In fact, Abram would become the spiritual father of the most important nation in the history of the world: the kingdom of God. He would also gain a new name (Abraham), which isn’t something to gloss over because, in the Old Testament, a name expressed a person’s essence. His name would be known, honored, and celebrated throughout the whole world. Had Abram stayed in Haran, he would have remained an insignificant nobody forgotten by the annals of history. But now⎯because of God⎯Abram has such significance we are still talking about him thousands of years after he lived.
This idea of a land and a people is critical because, in essence, God is beginning to reveal how He will fulfill the promise (Genesis 3:15) to bring about a Redeemer who will undo the mess caused by Adam and facilitated by the serpent in the Garden of Eden.
As Matthew H. Patton writes in his article, “Hope in the Offspring,” in the December 2024 issue of Tabletalk magazine:
“The problem of the serpent—people’s allegiance to him, and his very existence—will be solved not by Adam and Eve but by their offspring. In some future generation, the battle that began in the garden will reach its climax, and God will achieve a decisive victory through the woman’s offspring. As in Genesis 1:26, when God stated His intent to rule His world through people, so now God intends to defeat the rebellious serpent through human offspring.
Therefore, from its inception, history revolves around procreation: God’s good purpose to bring the promised offspring, and the serpent’s evil attempt to prevent this offspring. …
The many twists of the story highlight God’s special superintendence of this line. Very often, the line followed the younger of two sons. Moreover, the wife of the chosen man was often barren. Sarah, Rebekah, and Rachel all struggled with barrenness (11:30; 25:21; 29:31) and bore children only with God’s help (21:1; 25:21; 30:22). The promised line also had to survive multiple famines (e.g., 12:10), the threat of outside attack (32:8; 34:30), and premature death (38:7, 10). …
As the promised offspring endured these trials, God expanded on the promise of victory in the conflict with the serpent first announced in Genesis 3:15. As God engaged with the holy line, He unveiled new dimensions of this victory. The serpent caused humanity to lose the garden, but the promised offspring will inherit a new land (12:7). The serpent brought an end to humanity’s holy rule on God’s behalf (see 1:26), but God promised to bring kings through the holy line (17:6). The serpent threatened to fill the world with his followers, but God promised that the true offspring will be as abundant as the sand or the stars (15:5; 22:17). The serpent introduced a rift between God and humanity, but God will restore covenant relations with the holy line (17:7). In short, God’s victory over the serpent will be total: crushing the serpent’s head means the defeat all of the serpent’s evil purposes.”
The crucial point to make here is that the promise to Abram was never ultimately about Abram, the Jewish people, or the nation of Israel. The point of the promise to Abram was Jesus. God would faithfully preserve Abram’s bloodline in order that⎯in the fullness of time⎯His Son would incarnate and reveal Himself to be the Messiah. The true descendants of Abram are spiritual: those who are born again. Abram was not born faithful; he was made faithful by God’s call. In the same way, all believers are made so not by biology but by grace. To draw from Old Testament prophetic language, there are no natural trees that will endure; rather, we must all be grafted into a cultivated tree contrary to our nature (Romans 11:24; Jeremiah 11:16). Hence, as it says in Galatians 3:7–9:
Therefore, be sure that it is those who are of faith who are sons of Abraham. The Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, “All the nations will be blessed in you.” So then those who are of faith are blessed with Abraham, the believer. (italics mine)
All nations will be blessed because in heaven, God will fulfill His promise and have people from every tribe and tongue glorifying Him for eternity (Revelation 7:9–17). Because of Abram’s descendent⎯Christ⎯the elect will be blessed with redemption.
Even more, God assures Abram protection and influence. In verses 2b–3, the text says:
And so you shall be a blessing; and I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse. And in you all the families of the earth will be blessed.
In other words, as people treat Abram, so God will treat them. This in fact makes Abram the standard for how God treats everyone else on the planet. And going back to what was just said, because the promised descendants of Abram are Christ and believers, this means in modernity, God’s promise to bless and curse does not apply to a biological people. It applies to the Church. This, I think, is the main reason why, for hundreds of years up to the present, the United States of America has been regarded by many as the greatest nation in the history of the world. Why? Because it was founded on universal, objective Judeo-Christian principles. This allowed the Christian Church to flourish. God therein honored that promise and blessed the nation that blessed His Church. Our civilization is now on the decline because we’ve forgotten about God.
So, when we contextualize what Abram must abandon, it was in fact significant, but it paled in comparison with what God would bless him with. Faith takes one small step, while God takes a giant leap. Abram gave up something temporal and local for something eternal and universal.
So, how do we know that Abram believed God? Based on how he responded. God said, “Go!” and Abram went. Genesis 12:4–5 says:
So Abram went forth as the Lord had spoken to him; and Lot went with him. Now Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran. Abram took Sarai his wife and Lot his nephew, and all their possessions which they had accumulated, and the persons which they had acquired in Haran, and they set out for the land of Canaan; thus they came to the land of Canaan.
You see, God is the only One who can look into a person’s inner being and see faith regardless of what is happening on the outside. We, as people, are limited by our creatureliness. We can only see the outer man as a gauge of what’s happening on the inside. We thus look out in order to peek in. Abram’s faith is thus ascertained by his response to God’s Word.
Consequently, Abram passes through Canaan, and the Lord tells him that He will give that land to his descendants (Genesis 12:7). In time, a famine strikes the land, and Abram has to leave. He and his wife end up going to Egypt. Genesis 12:11–20 then says:
It came about when he came near to Egypt, that he said to Sarai his wife, “See now, I know that you are a beautiful woman; and when the Egyptians see you, they will say, ‘This is his wife’; and they will kill me, but they will let you live. Please say that you are my sister so that it may go well with me because of you, and that I may live on account of you.” It came about when Abram came into Egypt, the Egyptians saw that the woman was very beautiful. Pharaoh’s officials saw her and praised her to Pharaoh; and the woman was taken into Pharaoh’s house. Therefore he treated Abram well for her sake; and gave him sheep and oxen and donkeys and male and female servants and female donkeys and camels.
But the Lord struck Pharaoh and his house with great plagues because of Sarai, Abram’s wife. Then Pharaoh called Abram and said, “What is this you have done to me? Why did you not tell me that she was your wife? Why did you say, ‘She is my sister,’ so that I took her for my wife? Now then, here is your wife, take her and go.” Pharaoh commanded his men concerning him; and they escorted him away, with his wife and all that belonged to him.
If you are a Christian, I would tend to believe that at some point in your walk with God, you were unsure or uncertain about how things were going to play out. I would also tend to believe that you may have doubted your faith because you didn’t have all the answers. Well, the great hope I can communicate to you based on the text is this: Faith never has all the answers. In fact, if sometimes you are not certain, then consider this: neither was Abram. Even he did not have all the answers, and even he did not have 100% certainty about how things would unfold day-to-day.
How do we know this? Based upon what the Scriptures say. In Hebrews 11:8, the text elevates Abraham both as an example of great faith and also emphasizes that he did not know where he was being led:
By faith Abraham, when he was called, obeyed by going out to a place which he was to receive for an inheritance; and he left, not knowing where he was going.
Furthermore, In Genesis 20, we find Abram (now Abraham) in a similar situation to Egypt when he travels to the land of the Negev. There, he meets the king of Gerar, Abimelech, and he tells him that Sarah is not his wife but rather his sister (Genesis 20:2). Abimelech takes Sarah, but consequently, God comes to him in a dream and threatens him not to touch Abraham’s wife. Abimelech ends up giving her back to her husband and is obviously upset. He then asks Abraham, “Why would you do this to me?” In Genesis 20:11–13, he says:
Because I thought, surely there is no fear of God in this place, and they will kill me because of my wife. Besides, she actually is my sister, the daughter of my father, but not the daughter of my mother, and she became my wife; and it came about, when God caused me to wander from my father’s house, that I said to her, ‘This is the kindness which you will show to me: everywhere we go, say of me, “He is my brother.”’
Do you see how Hebrews 11:8 and Genesis 20 help to explain what happens in Genesis 12? There, God promises Abram land and a people. Abram’s faith is real (cf. Genesis 15:6), which is why he obeys God’s Word and lets go of so much. Yet, it seems as if as soon as Abram settles into Canaan, he has to leave because of famine. What, then, was he to think of the promise of land and offspring if he had to leave the land childless? Without rain, the promised land wouldn’t have seemed so promising. Add to that the fact that in those days, a sojourner lacked rights or protection. Abram and his family would thus be at the mercy of local peoples. Abram foresaw this potential reality, and thus, before he and his wife left his father’s house, he told his wife, “This is the kindness which you will show to me: everywhere we go, say of me, ‘He is my brother.’” Abram had a guaranteed promise, but not all the answers. So, he developed a contingency plan. Hence, when boxed in by the dangers of famine, sojourning, and possible loss of life, he adopted a policy of self-protection because, at the time, all he could see were a host of bad options.
Beloved, sin marred Abram’s faith just like it does mine, and just like it does yours. Nothing we will ever do in this life is perfect, but praise be to God that it is not the strength of my faith that saves me. It is not my grip on Christ, but rather, it is His grip on me that keeps and protects me. As Ephesians 2:8–9 says:
For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.
And Jesus says in John 10:27–28:
My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me; and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand.
The point of the Bible is Jesus, and looking at the life of Abram makes it plain that if we were to trust in him, there would be no hope. Each of the titans of faith in the Bible had an imperfect record that disqualified them from being the Messiah. This is why we can never read the Bible and look down on the saints of old but rather look in the mirror. God is teaching us that we are just as prone to sin and doing stupid things as the Bible’s characters. Therefore, we look outside of ourselves to Christ. And, when we look to God, it becomes clear that He strengthens and augments our faith through trials. As it is said, a faith that isn’t tested is a faith that can’t be trusted. A bulky, muscular, well-toned faith requires stress, exercise, and resistance. This is one reason why faith never has all the answers: because as our certainty in things goes down, our reliance on God goes up.
So, in Genesis 12, did Abram deceive Pharoah? Yes. Did he fail to protect his wife? Yes. Did he fail to shield Sarah’s dignity? Yes. Did he rely on God to provide protection and life according to His promise? No. Again, sin marred Abram’s faith, but he left Egypt with his wife, his life, and his livestock and servants. In fact, he left richer than he came and was blessed by the man he deceived. This doesn’t make any sense unless you see that it was God providentially overruling Abram’s faulty faith in order to bring about His purposes. Our faith will wax and wane, but praise be to God that His grace remains the same. And please don’t mistake what I am trying to say: I am in no way encouraging sloppy living or immoral decision-making in the name of faith. What I am attempting to do is open your eyes to God’s glory in that He tenderly cares for us even when we are careless. Furthermore, in the chronology of the text, God had just called Abram at the beginning of the chapter. My point is that I believe it is fair to say that in his spiritual walk, Abram is still a figurative baby. Because our faith grows by testing, God used the trial of Genesis 12 to spiritually mature him and grow his faith. This helps to explain why in this chapter, Abram operated based on self-protection: sacrificing his wife for himself. But then in Genesis 13, in dealing with land and his nephew (Lot), Abram’s maturing faith is demonstrated by the fact that trusting in God’s sovereignty gave him the freedom to be generous and to consider someone else first (Genesis 13:9).
My sister-in-law is an educator. She once told me the story of a student she was teaching in elementary school. She had administered an exam, and when grading one student’s paper, he had written in “Jesus” as his response to every question. When she asked him to explain, he said, “Jesus is always the answer.”
While I know this child did not do well on his exam, to the spiritual principle in his heart I say, “Yea and amen.” Our faith never has all the answers, but Christ has everything figured out. He speaks truth constantly in His Word, but often we fail to truly listen when He says, “Trust Me.” As Abram’s situation in Genesis 12 reveals, life can often be complicated and messy. There will invariably be times when our faith is in tension with reality; that is, with what is quick, easy, and seemingly practical, reasonable, or expedient. But, as it says in I John 5:4:
For whatever is born of God overcomes the world; and this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith.
I think it fair to say that in his sojourning and subsequent trials, Abram was made to feel uncomfortable from time to time. What I often find helpful when I feel overwhelmed or frazzled by a situation is to open the Scriptures and meditate on a picture of Christ. That is, not to allow my thoughts to be consumed with the situation but to figuratively look up and visualize Christ on the throne (for example, see Daniel 7:13–14 or Revelation 19:11–21). I find that when I reverberate on the problem, it seems so big. But when I dwell on Jesus, everything else seems to be so small. He is the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords, and He rules over every atom in the universe. Nothing in reality can do anything unless He says so. And thus, while I will never have all the answers, I trust in the One who has all the answers, even to the questions I’ve never asked.
I will close first with a quote from the Puritan George Swinnock and then a portion of Psalm 139. When listening to Swinnock, focus on how his words emanate from a deep-seated sense of marvel at how grand and majestic the Lord is. When listening to the Psalm, focus on how God both knows all and is present everywhere, all the time.
In his Works, George Swinnock writes:
“Though he is not far from you, yet he is far above you, and far beyond you⎯far above your thoughts, and beyond your comprehension. He dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen or can see (I Timothy 6:6). Try to reach the nearest planet with your arm, yet the knowledge of God is above and beyond. What a fool he be thought, who would attempt to climb to the stars. Yet to find out God to perfection he must climb to the stars. Yet to find out God to perfection he must climb much higher. The heavens are high, yet their height is finite; hell is deep, yet its depth determined; the earth is long, yet its length limited; the sea is broad, yet its breath is bounded; but God is infinite, boundless, and beyond all these.”
Psalm 139:1–12 says:
O Lord, You have searched me and known me. You know when I sit down and when I rise up; You understand my thought from afar. You scrutinize my path and my lying down, and are intimately acquainted with all my ways. Even before there is a word on my tongue, behold, O Lord, You know it all. You have enclosed me behind and before, and laid Your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is too high, I cannot attain to it.
Where can I go from Your Spirit? Or where can I flee from Your presence?
If I ascend to heaven, You are there; if I make my bed in Sheol, behold, You are there. If I take the wings of the dawn, if I dwell in the remotest part of the sea, even there Your hand will lead me, and Your right hand will lay hold of me. If I say, “Surely the darkness will overwhelm me, and the light around me will be night,” even the darkness is not dark to You, and the night is as bright as the day, darkness and light are alike to You.
Dr. C. H. E. Sadaphal