When I was a kid, we’d read John 3:16 this way. “God so loved Jon that he gave his only begotten son that if Jon believed in him, Jon would not perish but have eternal life.”

It was a way of personalizing the immensity of God’s love for each of us.

But there was a danger to that.

It puts us at the middle of the whole way God was working in the whole world.

We can move from “I am important to God”, to “I am the most important one to God.” And we can, I fear, from what I hear, move to “the people who are like me or become like me are the most important ones to God.” The phrase Jesus said was, “loved the world.”

You and I are important to God. But I am not the MOST or ONLY important one to God. And there is a massive, long-term plan that God is working through.

The trouble with long process is that when we look at each moment, we can be disappointed.

We understand it in many parts of our lives.

The birthing process is hard. Being a kid is hard. Being an adult is hard.

Often, we use moments or situations to understand the whole story, the whole of God’s work.

If God doesn’t heal me, it doesn’t mean that God doesn’t exist. If God doesn’t keep my loved one from dying, that doesn’t mean God doesn’t exist.

I may have questions. I may struggle. But there is a larger story.

The story of Abram that we read this morning is a story of the long work of God.

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More tomorrow.