Smoking Furnace, Burning Lamp

"And He said unto him, I am the LORD that brought thee out of Ur of the Chaldees, to give thee this land to inherit it. And he said, Lord GOD, whereby shall I know that I shall inherit it? And He said unto him, Take me an heifer of three years old, and a she goat of three years old, and a ram of three years old, and a turtledove, and a young pigeon. And He took unto Him all these, and divided them in the midst, and laid each piece one against another: but the birds divided He not. And when the fowls came down upon the carcasses, Abram drove them away. And when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram; and lo, an horror of great darkness fell upon him. And He said unto Abram, Know of a surety that thy seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs, and shall serve them; and they shall afflict them four hundred years; and also that nation, whom they shall serve, will I judge: and afterward shall they come out with great substance. And thou shalt go to thy fathers in peace; thou shalt be buried in a good old age. But in the fourth generation they shall come hither again: for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full. And it came to pass, that, when the sun went down, and it was dark, behold a smoking furnace, and a burning lamp that passed between those pieces. In the same day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, Unto thy seed have I given this land, from the river of Egypt unto the great river, the river Euphrates: the Kenites, and the Kenizzites, and the Kadmonites, and the Hittites, and the Perizzites, and the Rephaims, and the Amorites, and the Canaanites, and the Girgashites, and the Jebusites." (Genesis 15:7-21)

God reminds Abram in the beginning of this passage, just who it is that God is: He is the One that brought Abram out of Ur of the Chaldees safely into this new land which that same God promises that Abram will inherit. It would seem faithless to us to question God for a sign of this inheritance, yet God knows our frailties and patiently gives that which our faith needs to grow strong. The LORD then prepares a "covenant" to further aid Abram's faith.

At that time a covenant was a promise under a binding "seal" of agreement for the performance of some action, usually between two or more parties. Animals would be killed and split in half; and the two parties would walk between the parts of the dead animals, representing that they themselves would face the same fate of the sacrificial animals if they broke the promise of the covenant. Jeremiah 34:18-19 exemplifies such a covenant ritual.

In this case, however, both parties were not making a promise; only God made a promise, and thus, because only God bore the burden of keeping the covenant, it was only God who passed between the split carcasses. God waited until dark to perform the ritual, which meant Abram was busy keeping vultures and other carnivorous birds of prey away from the carcasses until darkness fell.

But we need to look a bit more closely at the animals that were used in this ritual. There was a three-year old heifer, and three year old she-goat, and a three year old ram, along with two different species of bird: the turtledove and the pigeon. I have said before and will say always that the Word of God is so multi-leveled that it is impossible for us to comprehend at this time, on this side of heaven, just what all is contained within it. This passage, for example, speaks prophetically (as the entire Word of God does) about Jesus Christ whose ministry lasted only three years before He died on the cross. These animals are the ones used in sin offerings, for the atonement of sins, as Jesus, the ultimate sin offering, also was.

The deep sleep that came upon Abram is the same deep sleep that came upon Adam when God took the rib from his body to create woman. The "horror" that befell Abram is that horror was either a sampling of the misery which engulfed the Israelites during their time of bondage to Egypt, or possibly the terror of knowing God's wrath. The Lord tells Abram all about the future wrath of God upon the Israelites, but He also speaks about their future redemption. I believe the birds that were not split in half, signify the heavenly redemption and restoration that Jesus provides to all who will accept it.

The Lord speaks to Abram during this deep sleep about all that will come to pass, and then, as the day finally winds down, and it is dark, the Lord passes through the split parts of the animals, not in any form that Abram would be able to observe and still live (for it is impossible in our mortal form to see God Himself and not die), but rather God appeared as a smoking furnace (God's wrath and judgment; the affliction that would befall Israel under the bondage to Egypt Exodus chapters 6 and 12; Jeremiah 11 speaks also of the smoking furnace) and as a burning lamp (a light in the darkness, salvation and restoration, as spoken of in Isaiah 62:1.) All of this the Israelites would experience until in their fourth generation, they are finally released from the punishment of their sins. Indeed, we will see that Moses, who led the Israelites out of Egypt, and his brother Aaron, were of the fourth generation of Israelites born in bondage, and so they signified the end of that period of God's judgment upon them.

What is important for us to see here, is that Abram was faithful, and obedient to follow God to a strange land. And only after that obedience occurred did the Lord reveal all that was revealed to Abram, and seal His promises with a covenant. We might experience persecution or trouble along the way, but the rewards, the revelation, to follow are always great.

The Lord taught Israel always to covenant only with men of righteousness or faithfulness to God, yet so often they were disobedient to His teaching and suffered the consequences of making pacts with the non-faithful. Yet God is always faithful to His covenant, He cannot be otherwise. Fortunately for Abram and for us, His promises to us are not "earned" by our works, but are simply a gracious gift of God to those who are faithful to Him and who seek after His righteousness, rather than after some form of their own.