Things That Were Written Aforetime...

In Titus 1:2, the apostle Paul declared his hope of “…eternal life, which God, that cannot lie, promised before the world began.” Indeed, the theme of the entire Bible is the scheme of redemption for the souls of mankind; the promise of everlasting life unto created beings made after the image of God. This promise, of which we find declared to Abram in Genesis chapter 12, is the hub around which every book, chapter, and verse in the Holy Scriptures revolves and is the foundational truth by which man is able to understand the Bible.

In Acts chapter 2, the apostle Peter preached Jesus Christ to thousands of Jews gathered together for the Feast of Pentecost. It was on this day that the church of our Lord was established and about three thousand souls were saved in obedience to the Gospel of Christ and baptism into His body (Acts 2:41). As Peter preached to these Jews who had assembled from every nation under Heaven, they were pricked in their hearts, believing the things Peter preached concerning Jesus, and then asked, “Men and brethren, what shall we do?" (v.37).

To this the inspired apostle, filled with the Holy Spirit and bestowed with authority from Christ (Matt. 16:19; John 20:21) declared, “Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. For the promise is unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call” (Acts 2:38-39).

It was there that Peter first connected the Abrahamic Covenant with the salvation of man and the kingdom of Christ, His church. Thus, thorough study of the Abrahamic Covenant, as it is revealed in Genesis chapter 12 is necessary to adequately understand the promises made and their fulfillment in the church.

Declaration of the Promises; Genesis 12

Though the promise of redemption for humanity was not originally given to Abraham (Gen. 3:15), it is through Abraham that the terms and the fulfillment of the promise is realized. In Genesis 12:1-3, God called

Abram saying, “Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto a land that I will shew thee: And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing: And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed.”

It is in these verses that the three-fold promise was first declared to the great patriarch. The specific promises given to Abraham were the land promise, the seed promise, and the nation promise. Though only the nation promise is explicitly given in this first declaration (v.2), the seed promise is necessarily inferred by the understanding that the fulfillment of the nation promise

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