Sermons
September 20, 2026 (Proper 20)
God’s Chosen People
Genesis 12:1-9
Maybe the call came in the middle of the night. “Abram, Abram…wake up!”
He opened his eyes, listened intently, trying to figure out who that unfamiliar voice belonged to. But he didn’t see anyone. Must have just been a dream, he thought, as he rolled over and began to doze off again.
But almost immediately, again the voice sounded in his ears: “Abram!” Now it was a little louder, a little sharper.
He sat up and looked over at Sarai, sleeping beside him. But she hadn’t stirred—like she didn’t even hear the voice.
Abram sat up in bed and looked around. No one else in the room. He glanced at his alarm clock. 4:45 in the morning. At this point if he lay back down, he might be able to get another hour of sleep before the alarm went off and he had to get up and go to work. Surely it was just a really vivid dream.
But just as soon as his head hit the pillow, the voice came again: “Abram!”
He sat back up with a sigh, put on his houseshoes and a sweatshirt, and got up. Down in the kitchen, Abram found the coffeepot by sense of touch, and plugged it in. As it began to perk, he went into the bathroom. He stood in the shower, clinging to that bar of soap that the commercials used to say would wake you up with its crisp, fresh scent. It didn’t work.
A few minutes later, he was at the mirror, examining the tiny little squares of tissue covering all the spots where he’d cut himself shaving.
“Abram!”
He looked around. Nobody was there. It’s too early in the morning for this! he thought irritably.
A few minutes later, coffee in hand, Abram sat down at the kitchen table, trying to clear his head. It was still early, and the sky was just starting to get light—but then, all of a sudden, it was like someone had turned on a spotlight.
“Abram, Abram!”
“Here I am—who are you and what do you want?” Abram replied, since clearly the voice wasn’t going away.
“I am the Lord your God, who created the heavens and the earth. It’s time to go: get Sarai up, and Lot, and start packing.”
“Packing? For what?”
“You’re moving, starting a new life.”
“Where?”
“I’ll show you the place. You’ll know when you get there.”
“What am I going to do there?”
“I’ve chosen you to be a blessing to all the nations of the world. You’ll be doing my will.”
Abram got up from the table and poured himself another cup of coffee. His head spun. We can’t just pick up and move! We’ve got commitments, obligations—a mortgage, bills to pay, Lot’s college education to save for! I just tore the roof off the house; we can’t leave it like that! Nobody would buy it! Sarai’s got her job, her own career; and Lot’s got his friends. He was going to be the captain of the football team this fall. I can’t ask either of them to drop everything and move!
By the time he got back to the table with his coffee, the bright light in the kitchen had gone out. He was glad that was over. He went upstairs and got his work clothes on.
Sarai was just starting to stir. “What are you doing up so early?” she asked Abram.
“You’ll think I’m crazy,” he said.
“Why? What happened?”
“Well, there was this bright light, and this voice: ‘I am the Lord,’ it said, and then it said we were supposed to move.”
“Move where?” Sarai asked.
“Didn’t say. Said we’d know when we got there.”
“You’re right. That is crazy. Come here, and let me feel your head. You must be coming down with something. I don’t want you up on that roof today.”
“I feel fine,” Abram said. “But we’re not moving. We can’t possibly just up and leave. There’s too many people counting on us. And what about Lot? He’d never forgive us if we made him change schools right before his senior year. Bad enough his grandpa moved us all here after Lot’s dad died—we can’t put him through all that again now that his grandpa’s gone too.”
“Yeah, and I’ve just started my new job—my boss would kill me if I told her I was quitting right after she gave me that big promotion.”
“We’re not moving,” Abram repeated. He went down and got Sarai some coffee, then headed outside to work on the roof.
How much different would the world be if that had been the way Abram responded when God called him? “No, Lord, I can’t do that! There’s too much at stake, too much to lose.” But he didn’t.
It says, “So Abram went, as the Lord had told him.” No argument, no discussion; he just picked up and went.
Nowadays we don’t really think much of people who just blindly, unthinkingly do what someone tells us to do. I daresay that even applies when we’re pretty sure God has told us to do something.
There are an awful lot of us, even, who try to argue God out of calling us to ministry. Remember Moses? His call story, including the argument he had with God to the point that God got mad, was my ordination scripture.[1]
There are certainly times when questioning authority is a good thing, whether that authority is a teacher,[2] a minister, a politician, or sometimes even a parent.
When I was little, my grandma used to tell me, “Don’t sing at the table.” I sing everywhere, all the time, and that sort of cramped my style; so I asked her why. She said, “My daddy always said that, and when I was growing up if your father told you not to do something, you didn’t ask why, you just didn’t do it.”
It was years before I discovered that wasn’t a hard-and-fast universal rule of etiquette; it was based on a proverb my great-grandpa had undoubtedly heard when he was growing up in the upper Midwest, something about if you sing at breakfast you’ll cry before dinner. (The folks in Iowa knew that proverb, which is how I figured out how it happened that Grandma didn’t think you should sing at the table.)
There are certainly times when we need to stop and think through what an authority figure is telling us—even if we feel like God is calling us to do something—to weigh the pros and cons and possible consequences. This is especially true when our own decision could affect someone else. Picking up and moving on a whim—or even because God said to—might be okay if you’re single, but if you’ve got a spouse and children, well, you’ve got more than your own life to take into consideration.
But can we make a case that sometimes we should follow Abram’s example?
God chose Abram, just like Jesus chose the disciples, who dropped everything and followed him into the unknown. Maybe God chooses us, too, to be Jesus’ followers, to be ministers, to serve in new and different ways.
Accepting that choice could mean radical change to our lives. It could just mean adding one more thing to an already crowded to-do list. It could mean we try something we were certain we could never do, for a variety of reasons. It could very well be uncomfortable for quite some time—and we might not know where we’ll end up.
In that kind of situation, it’s very easy to find excuses for why we can’t possibly do this new thing God is calling us to do. We’re too busy with what we’re doing now, or we can’t afford it, or we don’t have the skills or abilities required, or our families would never understand, or this, or that. And all of those are quite reasonable, understandable, and sensible excuses for not saying “yes” when God calls us to make a major change in our lives.
But there is something that overrules all of that. When God chooses us, God equips us. And then God makes an even more incredible promise: “I will bless you, so that you will be a blessing.”
[1] Exodus 3:1—4:17
[2] I had a social studies teacher in high school who wore a button every day that said, “Question authority”—even him.