“Overwhelmed”

Sometimes the Bible just stops me cold.

I mean, I realize it always should, but what can I tell you, I’m human, and it doesn’t always arrest my attention as it should. Which is about me, and certainly not about the Scriptures.

I began reading through the Bible again on my birthday this month, so I’m in Genesis. Here was a portion of my reading this morning, in Genesis 17, from Eugene Peterson’s paraphrase:

When Abram was ninety-nine years old, God showed up and said to him, “I am The Strong God, live entirely before me, live to the hilt! I’ll make a covenant between us and I’ll give you a huge family.”

Overwhelmed, Abram fell flat on his face.

Then God said to him, “This is my covenant with you: You’ll be the father of many nations. Your name will no longer be Abram, but Abraham, meaning that ‘I’m making you the father of many nations.’ I’ll make you a father of fathers—I’ll make nations from you, kings will issue from you. I’m establishing my covenant between me and you, a covenant that includes your descendants, a covenant that goes on and on and on, a covenant that commits me to be your God and the God of your descendants. And I’m giving you and your descendants this land where you’re now just camping, this whole country of Canaan, to own forever. And I’ll be their God.”

Here was the mercy of God to me as I went out on my prayer walk after reading:

He’s really there.
He’s the living God, the Strong God.
He makes covenant promises, and he keeps them.
To Abraham, his children, and a thousand generations, right up to and including this one.
Including me, and including you.
He is our God.

What a sweet grace to fall on my face today, overwhelmed.