Pastor Vicki Zust was the rector of St. Paul’s, Clarence, NY. Having completed a 2 year cycle of reading the entire Bible she decided to try something different. As she writes, "So I went through the Old Testament and wrote down the stories that a lot of our theology and history depends on. It turns out there are 40 of them." I am excerpting them here. Read it here in Genesis Chapter 17:5.
“Some time after the covenant conversation – and after Sarai, Abram’s wife takes matters into her own hands (more on that next week) God comes back to Abram and says, “If you will be trustworthy and walk in my ways, I will make you the father of many nations.”
” God identifies himself as either God Almighty or the God of the mountains. The Hebrew can be read both ways.
” God tells Abram that he is changing his name from Abram – which means exalted ancestor to Abraham – which means ancestor of a multitude.
” This time God sets some conditions on Abraham. His descendants must be circumcised (the male ones, that is).
” God also changes Sarai’s name to Sarah. God tells Abraham that Sarah – who is now old – will give birth to a son who will be named Isaac.”