When God Swore By Himself

Recall that the last chapter gave us occasion to have one finger holding a place in the book of Hebrews while our main place was in Genesis. That will be the case again here in Genesis 15. This time have a bookmark in Hebrews 6:13-18 as our New Testament commentary.

There are two main dimensions to this text today—one coming from Abram and the other from God. But it is important not to see God simply reacting to Abram’s doubt. God’s certainly does have provision for Abram’s doubt. But God is not discovering anything new here. The chapter’s beginning hints at the divine initiative: ‘After these things the word of the LORD came to Abram in a vision: ‘Fear not, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great’ (v. 1).

• Doubt and Faith

• Sign and Substance

Doctrine. When the father of all those who have faith doubted and asked for a sign—God swore by Himself.            

Doubt and Faith

While Abram’s sinful actions before had testified to a hit to his faith, now he finally comes clean, or rather, he has been brought to a place of confession:

“But Abram said, ‘O Lord GOD, what will you give me, for I continue childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?’ And Abram said, ‘Behold, you have given me no offspring, and a member of my household will be my heir’” (vv. 2-3).

The question, “What will you give me?” isn’t simply a request for information. Abram had already been given an impressing list in Chapter 12. WHAT? here really means HOW—IF there’s no … No offspring. It all hinges on at least one son. In other words, the promise makes no sense in light of circumstances. This is no final defeater to his faith. This is more like that father in the Gospels about his son being led away by demons, ““I believe; help my unbelief!” (Mk. 9:24)

So God brings him back to the promise in verses 4 and 5. The same promises as in Chapter 12 and 13. And this shows us two very important things to look for in our season of doubt.

First, when God takes initiative in our doubt, He leads with His word—‘the word of the LORD came to him’ (v. 4). This is the formula so often used when a prophetic book begins or when a prophet begins his ministry. Why? Because only the word of God ever created new things: “It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life” (Jn. 6:63).

Second, the same formula of words about the offspring—‘the stars, if you are able to number them … So shall your offspring be’ (v. 5)—reminds us that God’s way is to remind us. When God opens up His word to us, it is not His method to have us always chasing new and sensational mysteries; but His crystal-clear, time-tested good news.

And then there is that famous passage that Paul and James both quote (Rom. 4:3; Gal. 3:6; Jas. 2:23)—‘And he believed the LORD, and he counted it to him as righteousness’ (v. 6). Abram believed, and God counted it to Abram’s account as righteousness. So the doctrine of justification by faith alone is not only a biblical doctrine, but even an Old Testament doctrine. The Hebrew word אָמַן is better rendered “trust” here rather than a generic belief.

Sign and Substance

Note the very next breath after that strange imagery in verse 17, the very next words are ‘On that day the LORD made a covenant with Abram’ (v. 18a). The Scripture is treating this action as the making of that covenant. The ‘smoking fire pot and … flaming torch [that] passed between these pieces’ (v. 17) is a very unique vision of God’s presence. We cannot really call it an “anthropomorphism” because it isn’t the form of a man, but nevertheless something else in creation. Why this form?

I mentioned in passing last time the ANE practice of the Suzerain treaty. One aspect of it I didn’t mention was the ceremony. When the Great King and the lesser vassal kings would enter into this covenant relationship, they would each take animals, split them in half and lay the two pieces opposite each other at a distance enough to form a pathway for the two kings to walk together, hand in hand. This would signify that if either of the two kings went back on their mutual obligations, they would become like those animals—split into pieces. We see this imagery in Jeremiah,

“And the men who transgressed my covenant and did not keep the terms of the covenant that they made before me, I will make them like the calf that they cut in two and passed between its parts” (34:18).

The idea of such a treaty is that it is bilateral. There are two (or more) parties, so that both sides bear a responsibility. It is conditional. The favorable relationship remains in effect so long as those mutual terms are met.

Unlike that covenant, there was another kind of treaty called the royal grant. In it, the Great King would simply gift the lesser parties out of his generosity.1 Now what do we notice about this ceremony? Three things from the ceremony itself, and then I must add a fourth from the covenant as a whole because it will be seen in Chapter 17, and it will inform how we interpret here:

First, Abram is not even awake—‘As the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell on Abram’ (v. 12). He will have no part. He will lie down as a dead man.

Second, God would walk through the pieces alone (v. 17)—signifying that He alone would bear the responsibilities of the covenant.

Third, the animals are still split in pieces (v. 10)—signifying that the cost would still be death.

Fourth, we will find in 17:1-2, that in fact there are conditions to this covenant of grace, even though God will bear the ultimate burden and guarantee the results.

Why does that fourth point matter here? It is simply that Israel’s failure and ours will still earn a penalty of death. Our sin will still make us (by all normal rights) covenant breakers.

What then is the real substance of this sign? Clearly it wasn’t literally a moving pot and a fire! What does the author of Hebrews tell us?

“For when God made a promise to Abraham, since he had no one greater by whom to swear, he swore by himself” (Heb. 6:13).

How is this God swearing by Himself? He is saying, in effect, that as surely as those human covenant breakers will be torn limb from limb and bear the whole weight of the covenant on themselves, so I will bear that awful weight. But here is the difference: Whereas the covenant breakers will turn from their promise, God alone will never turn from His.

God’s presence is that fiery substance going through the pieces, yes; but the more we make our own pathway through God’s word, the more we see that how God shows up to fulfill this in history makes Him the animal pieces. His Son would be broken, torn apart, with the fire of God falling on Him instead of on those who receive the promise. So the author of Hebrews continues,

“For people swear by something greater than themselves, and in all their disputes an oath is final for confirmation. So when God desired to show more convincingly to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable character of his purpose, he guaranteed it with an oath, so that by two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us” (Heb. 6:16-18).

Both Abraham’s doubt as the backdrop and ‘the oath’ (v. 17) we can say that Hebrews is pointing back to this ceremony here.

Practical Use of the Doctrine

Use 1. Correction. If the father of all those who have faith also had doubt, what does that mean for us? I always have my antennae up for the next legalistic fad in the church. One recurring mood is a war against weakness. I have even heard words like “brokenness” and “victim” treated as weasel words for what are really treasured sins and creeping liberalism. But here in our passage today we have a strong man made weak—a blessed man feeling destitute. In fact, there’s even an element of surprise in the move from Chapter 14 to 15. Wasn’t Abram just flying high with a military victory and meeting this messenger from God? How much time had passed by? We don’t really know. The first words are just “After these things” (v. 1). We have to remember that a person can seem to be doing very well, but wrestling with the innermost kind of struggles. Between Chapter 14 and Chapter 15, life happens. You wake up one day, a year later—ten or twenty years later—and say, “What just happened?” And then, “Am I even a Christian?” How can it be that I will receive God Himself, given this thing?

Use 2. Exhortation. One commentator makes this application of Abram’s honest words to God at the beginning of this text:

“So what should you do when the reality gap overwhelms your faith? You should lay it all out before God. Abram opened all his concerns out before God. Even doubting thoughts and feelings that border on sin are better laid out before the gracious eyes of the Lord than nursed in our hearts.”2

Waltke adds in his commentary that “he complains out of his faith, not his unbelief.”3 That’s one way to put it. The point is that this is not irreverence, but vulnerability or desperation.

Use 3. Consolation. God often steps in to console and encourage His weary saints when doubt begins to set in. When Jacob began to fear Esau’s pursuit, “the angels of God met him” (Gen. 32:1). When Jesus heard that the authorities had cast out the man born blind after He had just healed him John 9:35, He was quick to come to him. And following Paul’s trial, “the Lord stood by him and said, ‘Take courage, for as you have testified to the facts about me in Jerusalem, so you must testify also in Rome” (Acts 23:11). In our dark seasons, God has already taken initiative. But the question must always be HOW? The reason this matters is because we will seek out alternative consolation.

Look back to God’s first reiteration of the promise. It’s the central promise: ‘Fear not, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great’ (v. 1b). Of this Calvin comments,

“By the use of the word ‘shield,’ he signifies that Abram would always be safe under his protection. In calling himself his ‘reward,’ He teaches Abram to be satisfied with Himself alone.”4

In our doubt, God not only swears by Himself, but He holds out Himself. Gaining God is the best of the good news—We get Him. And in having God in Christ, we have all things worth having. I close with these words of the Psalmist saying this exact thing:

“Whom have I in heaven but you? And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever” (Ps. 73:25-26).

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1. Belcher makes an addition point about the royal grant, that it “is normally given to the servant in response to his loyalty to the master.” Nevertheless, Belcher points to God’s action here meaning “that He takes it upon Himself to ensure that the promises are fulfilled” (Genesis, 124, 125).

2. Iain M. Duguid, Living in the Gap Between Promise and Reality: The Gospel According to Abraham (Phillipsburg, NJ: Presbyterian & Reformed Publishing, 1999), 55.

3. Waltke, Genesis: A Commentary, 241.

4. Calvin, Commentaries, I:399.