Even after the flood, man continued to turn against God to such an extent
that before long people were worshiping animals and non-living objects
such as the moon, sun, and stars. Mesopotamia (modern day Iran and Iraq)
had two significant centers of moon worship. Ur and Haran, Ur located near
where the Euphrates and Tigris River flow into the Persian Gulf, was a large
and important city with a massive ziggurat (TOWER) dominating its
landscape.
Terrah a moon worshiper living in Ur, had three sons: Abraham, Nahor, and
Haran. They each married and stayed close to home. Harans wife had a son
whom they named Lot. How pleased Terrah must have been to have a
grandson! But Sarai, Abraham’s wife, was unable to have children. It
seemed that Abrahams would not be providing grandchildren for Terrah.
Then a worst tragedy stuck: Haran died, leaving his son without a father.
Terrah took his grandson, Lot into his home.
Then one day Terrah decided to leave Ur. He took his son Abraham, his
daughter in law Sarai, and his grandson Lot with him as he travelled the
north along the river to Haran before he settled down. That’s where Terrah
died, a dedicated old moon-worshiper.
How long would this continue? Would man never turn back to the living God
who created him?
God spoke to a single man, one of Terahs sons. God spoke to Abraham!
“I want you to leave your country, your people, and your family and go to a
land I will show you. I will make you a great nation and I will bless you; I
will make you famous and through you ill bless others. Yes, I will bless
anyone who blesses you and curse anyone who curses you. Yet all peoples of
the earth will be blessed through you.”
So Abraham did as God said; he left. At age seventy-five, he took his wife,
his nephew Lot and all the possessions and people he had accumulated in
Haran and went down to Canaan.
Abrahams arrived in Shechem, where the Canaanites lived. These people
worship many gods, some in human in form, others half human, half animal.
There God appeared to Abraham again.
“To your children I will give this land.” So Abram built an altar to God right
there to show allegiance to the true and Living God despite the fact that he
and his wife had no children.
Then Abraham moved to further south to a place later called Bethel. He
settled there, built another altar to God, and worship Him.
Abrahams father and his people were moon-worshiper. In Canaan, people
were worshiping all kinds of false gods. Yet once again God graciously
spoke to someone undeserving. Now Abraham would be a light of hope in a
dark world; one man following the true God in world of false gods.
