You might say that worship is our response to God’s revelation of Himself. God reveals Himself in a general sense through creation. But sometimes the Lord also has stepped into history to reveal Himself specifically in words and actions. The account of Abram/Abraham contains more than one time that God spoke clearly to him. So at each intersection, Abraham/Abram has the opportunity to worship well, or to get it wrong.
Keep in mind that Father Abraham did not have a Bible in which to read about how “worship” happens. All he could do was to decide to trust what he was told and act accordingly by obedience. Abram did not invent worship. He discovered it.
Now the LORD said to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you. And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed." Genesis 12:1-3
We are not told HOW Abram heard the voice of the Lord; only that the Lord spoke to him one day. It is another of those very specific, yet very rare moments of communication from God. And in this account, the words of God are not general impressions or an uninterpreted dream, leaving Abram to wonder if that might have been God, and to seek advice on what it might have meant. No, this message is specific and detailed. Go from. Go to. I will. You will.
Go from. From your country, your kindred, your father’s house.
Keep in mind that Abram is advanced in years already by this point. He is not leaving his father’s house as a youngster moving out on his own. No, he is the son who is honoring his father by caring for him in his old age, preparing to inherit the estate in the relatively-near future. But God calls him to abandon that family commitment, which is especially surprising, given God's clear attitude toward family, as stated elsewhere:
"'Honor your father and your mother, as the LORD your God commanded you, that your days may be long, and that it may go well with you in the land that the LORD your God is giving you. Deuteronomy 5:16
Go to. To the land that I will show you.
Isn’t it odd that, given as specific as this calling was, God did not provide even a hint of what direction to move, much less exactly how big the tract of land would be or what kind of place he was going? Abram’s choice was whether to take the Big Risk in obeying what little bit of information he had, rather than to wait for the entire mission to be unfolded for him.
For that matter, there is no record that God was giving navigation hints or directions along the way: “Go three miles and hang a left at the tamarisk tree, and then just a two-week walk and you’re there!” No, instead, it even seems that Abraham was wandering about, slowly discovering the boundaries of his descendants' eventual inheritance. The old man became a nomad and continued to live in tents for a quarter of a century, waiting for another, clarifying word from God. No. God says He will show Abram, but it hasn’t happened yet when the man says yes to this venture with God.
By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance. And he went out, not knowing where he was going. Hebrews 11:8
Why would God tell Abram to abandon his father like this? We can assume that his father was an idolater, and that Abram needed to forge a new direction, spiritually and otherwise. This was to be the first generation of a man who broke away from an earthly heritage in order to pursue another one that was better.
For he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God. Hebrews 11:10
Go from. Go to. I will. I will make of you a great nation. I will bless you. I will make your name great.
A great nation? The other two statements from God would have been easier to believe: I will make your name great. I will bless you. But this blessing of becoming a great nation seemed impossible! Not only that, but it continued to seem impossible for another quarter of a century! Abram is 75 years old when he hears the promise that he will be made a great nation. And some 23 years later, still nothing had happened. What’s more, Abram never lived to see anything other than a few people in his household. He would have to trust mightily that the promise would come true, even if in another generation.
Therefore from one man, and him as good as dead, were born descendants as many as the stars of heaven and as many as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore. Hebrews 11:12
To review: God told Abram to go from, go to, and I will. Now He also says you will. You will be a blessing. Those who bless you will be blessed themselves. Any who dishonor you will be cursed. All the families of the earth will be blessed through you. And this series of promises is about as impossible to believe as the flood would have been to Noah. This little old guy and his wife are going to change the trajectory of all human life.
Abraham is called the father of our faith because he demonstrated faith at these critical times in his life when God spoke to him. He was willing to risk it all, move and follow, act as if he believed in the word that God had spoken so clearly to him. I guess that’s what faith is; not a passive intellectual assent to the claims of God. But taking action, placing all his weight on the promise, and acting on what God said as if her had evidence already that it would come true. I guess that’s why they call it faith; otherwise, it would be called sight.
These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. Hebrews 11:13
So, when we call Abraham the father of our faith, it is a well-earned label for him. Abram leaves us all a heritage of obedience-as-faith, or obedience-as-worship. This is how we worship: We behave as if we believed what God said, and when we say yes to God, it is an act of worship.
YOUR ENCOUNTER
Most people in the Western hemisphere think of a word like FAITH as an abstract concept, as if BELIEVE means GIVE INTELLECTUAL ASSENT. I believe your story. I believe Abraham Lincoln was the sixteenth President of the United States. I believe in love.
But to the ancient and the Eastern mindset, a word like FAITH is a concrete action, as if BELIEVE means TAKE ACTION. I trust that this chair will hold my weight. I trust you to watch my children while I run an errand. I trust your directions.
Abraham showed that he believed when he moved. Faith means you move first. You obey before you see the results.
I heard the story of a Bible translator living among the people group whose language he was translating into. They had no word in their language for "faith." So the translator was stumped. One day, one of the people from the village came in from working hard and flopped into a chair across the room. Suddenly, the translator leaped up and said, "What do you call what you just did, where you let yourself go down with your whole weight on that chair? That's the word for faith!"
That moment of trust is the moment when you put your whole weight down on something. Having faith in Jesus is betting your life that He is who He claimed to be. If heaven isn't real, then you will have lost everything.
If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied. 1 Corinthians 15:19
Think of something that would be a total waste for you if Christianity is not true. What one thing would you do, or not do, if you didn't believe what God says? Consciously hand that over to God for safekeeping once again. This is your spiritual act of worship. Share with someone what you learned, and write of your experience.