Scripture Daily

Context No. 2049 of 4322 · Genesis

Context · Reflection

Genesis 17:1-8: in context

1When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the LORD appeared to Abram and said to him, “I am God Almighty. Walk before me and be blameless. 2I will make my covenant between me and you, and will multiply you exceedingly.” 3Abram fell on his face. God talked with him, saying, 4“As for me, behold, my covenant is with you. You will be the father of a multitude of nations. 5Your name will no more be called Abram, but your name will be Abraham; for I have made you the father of a multitude of nations. 6I will make you exceedingly fruitful, and I will make nations of you. Kings will come out of you. 7I will establish my covenant between me and you and your offspring after you throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be a God to you and to your offspring after you. 8I will give to you, and to your offspring after you, the land where you are traveling, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession. I will be their God.”

When Abram is ninety-nine years old, the LORD appears to him and says, I am God Almighty; walk before me, and be blameless. Then God renews and enlarges his covenant, changing Abram's name to Abraham, father of a multitude of nations, and promising to be God to him and to his offspring after him. But before all the promises comes the call: walk before me, and be blameless. God sets Abraham's whole life in his presence, and calls him to live it there with integrity.

The call to walk before God is worth dwelling on. To walk before someone is to live one's life in their presence, aware of their eyes, conducting oneself as one seen by them. God calls Abraham to walk before him, to live his whole life consciously in God's presence, aware that God sees all he does, and so to be blameless, to live with integrity because he lives before the face of God. The call to blamelessness is grounded in the call to walk before God: it is the sense of living in God's presence, under his eyes, that shapes a life of integrity. This gives us a frame for our own lives. We can live as though God were absent, or far off, or not attending to the details of our days, and so live carelessly, one way when observed by others and another way when unseen. The call to walk before God changes this: to live conscious that God sees, that our whole life unfolds in his presence, that there is no unseen moment, no hidden place outside his sight. And this consciousness of living before God's face is what shapes integrity. The one who walks before God, aware of his presence, lives the same whether others watch or not, because God always watches; lives with integrity, because there is no moment outside his sight. I have set the LORD always before me, the psalmist says; because he is at my right hand, I will not be moved. To set God before us, to live conscious of his presence, is the foundation of a blameless life. This is not a burden but a steadying gift. To walk before God is to live in the awareness of the presence of the One who loves us and sees us, and so to live with the integrity and wholeness that such awareness brings. The call to Abraham is the call to us: to walk before God, living our whole lives consciously in his presence, and so to be blameless, our conduct shaped by the awareness that we live, always, before the face of God. To walk humbly with your God, Micah says; and the life lived before God's face is a life shaped, in every moment, by his presence.

Do I live as though God were absent or not attending to the details of my days, conducting myself one way when observed and another when unseen, or can I take up the call given to Abraham, to walk before God and be blameless, living my whole life consciously in his presence, aware that there is no unseen moment outside his sight, and letting that awareness shape a life of integrity before the face of God?

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