The Call of Abram

1 ^mNow the Lord said¹ to Abram, ⁿ“Go ^ofrom your country² and your kindred and your father’s house to ^pthe land that I will show you. 2 And I will make of you a ^qgreat nation, and I will ^rbless you and ^smake your name great, so that ^tyou will be a blessing.

7 Then the Lord ^aappeared to Abram and said, ^b“To your offspring I will give this land.” So he ^cbuilt there an altar to the Lord, who had appeared to him.

7 And he said to him, “I am the Lord who brought you out ^bfrom Ur of the Chaldeans ^cto give you this land to possess.” 8 But he said, “O Lord God, ^dhow am I to know that I shall possess it?” 9 He said to him, “Bring me a heifer three years old, a female goat three years old, a ram three years old, a turtledove, and a young pigeon.” 10 And he brought him all these, ^ecut them in half, and laid each half over against the other. ^fBut he did not cut the birds in half. 11 And when birds of prey came down on the carcasses, Abram drove them away.

12 ^gAs the sun was going down, a ^hdeep sleep fell on Abram. ⁱAnd behold, dreadful and great darkness fell upon him. 13 Then the Lord said to Abram, “Know for certain that ^jyour offspring will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs and will be servants there, and they will be ^kafflicted for ^lfour hundred years. 14 But ^mI will bring judgment on the nation that they serve, and afterward ⁿthey shall come out with great possessions. 15 As for you, you shall go to your fathers in peace; ^oyou shall be buried in a good old age. 16 And ^pthey shall come back here in the fourth generation, for ^qthe iniquity of the Amorites is ^rnot yet complete.”

17 When the sun had gone down and it was dark, behold, a smoking fire pot and a flaming torch passed between these pieces. 18 ^sOn that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying, “To your offspring I give¹ this land, ^tfrom the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates, 19 the land of the Kenites, the Kenizzites, the Kadmonites, 20 the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Rephaim, 21 the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites and the Jebusites.”

13 And behold, ^bthe Lord stood above it¹ and said, ^c“I am the Lord, the God of Abraham your father and the God of Isaac. ^dThe land on which you lie I will give to you and ^eto your offspring. 14 Your offspring shall be like the ^fdust of the earth, and you shall ^gspread abroad ^hto the west and to the east and to the north and to the south, and ⁱin you and your offspring shall all the families of the earth be blessed.

24 And Joseph said to his brothers, ^o“I am about to die, but ^pGod will visit you and bring you up out of this land to the land that he ^qswore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.”