Genesis 15
1 After all this had happened, God spoke to Abram in a vision, telling him, “Don't be afraid, Abram! I am your protector, and your truly great reward!”
Some time later, Abram had a vision in which Yahweh spoke to him and said, “Do not be afraid of (anything/your enemies). I will protect you [MTY], and I will give a great reward.”
2 But Abram replied, “Lord God, what good is whatever you give me? I don't have any children, and the heir to all that I have is Eliezer of Damascus.”
But Abram replied, “Yahweh God, how can you give me what I truly want, because I have no children, and the one who will be like a son and inherit all my possessions is my servant Eliezer from Damascus!”
3 Abram went on to complain, “Look! You haven't given me any children, so a servant from my household has to be my heir!”
Abram added, “You have not given me any children, so think about this: A servant in my household will inherit all I own!”
4 But then the Lord told him, “This man won't be your heir. Your heir will be your very own son.”
Yahweh replied, “No! He will not be the one who will inherit it. Instead, you yourself will be the father of the one who will inherit everything you own.”
5 The Lord took Abram outside and said to him, “Look up at the sky. See if you can count the stars! That's how many descendants you will have!”
Then Yahweh took Abram outside [of his tent] and said, “Look up at the sky! Can you count the stars? No, you cannot count them because there are so many of them, and your descendants will be as numerous as the stars.”
6 Abram trusted what the Lord said, and so the Lord counted Abram as being in a right relationship with him.
Abram believed that what Yahweh said would happen. And because of that, Yahweh considered that Abram was righteous.
7 The Lord also told him, “I am the Lord, who led you from Ur of the Chaldeans to give you this land for you to own.”
Yahweh also said to him, “I am Yahweh. I am the one who brought you from Ur in Chaldea land. I brought you here to give you this land to possess.”
8 “But Lord God, how can I be certain that I will own it?” Abram asked.
But Abram replied, “Yahweh God, how can I know for sure that this land will belong to me?”
9 The Lord told him, “Bring me a cow, a goat, and a ram, all of them three years old, together with a dove and a young pigeon.”
God said to him, “Bring a three-year-old heifer and a three-year-old goat to me, and a dove and a pigeon.”
10 So Abram took and killed the three animals. Then he cut them in half, and placed each half opposite the other. However, he didn't cut the birds in half.
So Abram brought all of them and killed them and cut each of the animals in half. He arranged the halves of each one, side by side. But he did not cut the pigeon and dove in half.
11 When vultures flew down on the carcasses, Abram frightened them off.
Birds that eat dead flesh came down to eat the carcasses, but Abram shooed them away.
12 As the sun went down, a deep sleep came over Abram, and at the same time a dense and terrifying darkness fell on him.
As the sun was going down, Abram fell sound asleep, and suddenly everything around him became dark and frightening.
13 The Lord explained to Abram, “You can be absolutely sure that your descendants will be strangers in a foreign land, where they will be slaves and mistreated for 400 years.
Then God said to Abram, “I want you to know that your descendants will become foreigners living in a land that does not belong to them. They will become slaves of the owners of that land. The owners of the land will mistreat them for 400 years.
14 However, I will punish the nation that makes them slaves, and later on they will leave, taking many valuable possessions with them.
But then I will punish the people of that country that made them become slaves, and then your descendants will leave that country, taking many possessions with them.
15 But as for you, you will die in peace and be buried, having lived a good long life.
But as for you, you will die [EUP] peacefully when you are very old.
16 Four generations later your descendants will come back here to live, because right now the sins of the Amorites have not reached their full extent.”
After your descendants have been slaves for 400 years, they will return here, and take control of this land and defeat the Amor people-group. Those people will, because those people have not yet sinned enough to deserve to be punished now.”
17 After the sun set and it grew dark, suddenly a smoking furnace and a flaming torch appeared and passed between the halves of the animal carcasses.
When the sun had set and it had become dark, [unexpectedly] a blazing torch and a clay pot containing burning coals from which smoke was rising appeared and went between the halves of the animals.
18 This is how the Lord made an agreement with Abram that day and promised him, “I'm giving this land to your descendants. It extends from the Wadi of Egypt to the great Euphrates River,
And on that day Yahweh made an agreement with Abram. Yahweh told him, “I will give to your descendants all the land between the river that is on the eastern border of Egypt to the south, and north to the huge Euphrates River.
19 and includes the territory of the Kenites, Kenizzites, Kadmonites,
That is the land where the Ken, the Keniz, the Kidmon,
20 Hittites, Perizzites, Rephaites,
the Heth, the Periz, the Repha,
21 Amorites, Canaanites, Girgashites, and Jebusites.”
the Amor, the Canaan, the Girgash, and the Tebus people-groups live.”
