The NIV 365 Day Devotional

Abraham: Learning to Trust

Change always means leaving the security of the familiar and learning to trust God, the power greater than ourselves. Abraham, originally called Abram, began his journey toward friendship with God when his father, an idol-worshiper, decided to go to the land of Canaan, but made it only as far as Harran.

Not until after his father’s death did Abraham hear God tell him to leave his relatives behind and move on to Canaan. Rather than allow sentimentality to fasten him to his home of origin, Abraham responded to God’s promise to bless him, multiply his descendants and show him a new land. So Abraham ventured out in faith to the realm his father had dreamed about, risking the safe for the unfamiliar.

Abraham’s journey into the unknown at age 75 provides a model to all of us who have had to leave familiar surroundings or unhealthy patterns to get healthy and to come into a closer relationship with God.

In order to grow spiritually, we must first let go of the security of the past—even a “secure” but harmful past—and be willing both to make and learn from our mistakes. Abraham made plenty of his own: he twice pretended his wife was his sister (12:10–20; 20:1–18), he tried to control the fulfillment of God’s promise by fathering a child with a concubine (16:1–16), and he struggled in his faith (17:17–18). But God rescued and protected Abraham both from his enemies and from himself, because he knew that even the child of an idol-worshiper who was willing could learn the art of trust. Regardless of our pasts, we, too, can learn to trust God if we will only let go.

PRAYER:

Lord, help me let go of my past that I may learn to trust you.

Taken from the NIV Recovery Devotional Bible.