“Now the LORD had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto a land that I will shew thee:”
My Notes
What Does Genesis 12:1 Mean?
God speaks to Abram — and the first thing He says is: leave. "Now the LORD had said unto Abram, Get thee out" — the Hebrew (lekh-lekha) is intensely personal: go yourself, go for yourself. It's a command directed at Abram alone. Nobody else in Ur received this call. The journey is individual before it becomes national.
"Of thy country" — leave the land you know. The geography that defined your identity. The borders of your familiarity. The place where you belong. "And from thy kindred" — leave your extended family. The social network. The clan structure. The web of relationships that provided security and identity. "And from thy father's house" — leave your immediate family. The innermost circle. The most intimate belonging.
The three separations move inward: country → kindred → father's house. Each one is more costly than the last. Leaving your country is hard. Leaving your relatives is harder. Leaving your father's house — your primary identity, your deepest roots — is the hardest. God asks for all three.
"Unto a land that I will shew thee" — the destination is unnamed. God doesn't say where. He says I will show you. The journey begins with a blank destination and a full requirement: leave everything you know and go where I tell you. The call is pure trust — obedience in the absence of information. Abram knows what he's leaving. He doesn't know where he's going. And God considers that arrangement sufficient.
Reflection Questions
- 1.What is God asking you to leave — a comfort, a community, an identity — that you've been holding onto because the destination isn't clear yet?
- 2.The three separations go deeper: country, kindred, father's house. Which level of leaving is hardest for you, and why?
- 3.God withholds the destination. Why do you think He requires obedience before providing clarity — and how does that build faith?
- 4.Abram left 'not knowing where he was going.' Have you ever obeyed God without knowing the destination? What happened?
Devotional
Leave everything you know. Go somewhere I haven't named yet. That's the call that started everything.
God's first words to Abram aren't a promise (those come in verse 2). They're a command: get out. Leave. Three things: your country, your kindred, your father's house. The comfortable, the connected, and the core — all of it, left behind. For a destination that doesn't have a name yet.
The three separations get more painful as they go deeper. Your country — that's geography. Hard, but manageable. Your kindred — that's community. The people who share your blood and your holidays. Leaving them means losing your social safety net. Your father's house — that's identity. Who you are comes from where you come from. And God says: leave that too. All of it. For something I haven't shown you yet.
"Unto a land that I will shew thee." The destination is deliberately withheld. God could have said: go to Canaan. He doesn't. He says: go where I'll show you. The blank destination is the test. Abram isn't being asked to evaluate the quality of the destination and then decide if it's worth the cost. He's being asked to trust the one giving the directions. The faith isn't in the destination. It's in the director.
Every significant move of faith has this structure. God asks you to leave what you know before He shows you where you're going. The clarity comes after the obedience, not before. You don't get the address and then decide whether to pack. You pack. You leave. And the destination reveals itself on the road.
If God is asking you to leave something — a comfort, a community, an identity — and you're waiting for the full itinerary before you obey, Abram's call is the model. He left not knowing where he was going (Hebrews 11:8). And the not-knowing was the faith.
Commentary
Trusted original commentary from respected historical Bible scholars and theologians.
Now the Lord had said unto Abram,.... In Ur of the Chaldees, before he came and dwelt in Charran, as seems from Act 7:2…
- The Call of Abram 6. שׁכם shekem Shekem, “the upper part of the back.” Here it is the name of a person, the owner of…
Get thee out of thy country - There is great dissension between commentators concerning the call of Abram; some…
We have here the call by which Abram was removed out of the land of his nativity into the land of promise, which was…
Now the lord said Lit. "and Jehovah said." The narrative opens with characteristic simplicity, and with the abruptness…
Cross References
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