Genesis is agonising. It’s full of abandonment and abuse, anxiety and anger, anguish and avoidance, barrenness and blaming. There’s childhood trauma, defensiveness and denial, emotional fusion, fear and famine, idolatry and judgement, lying and longing, manipulation and mocking, sibling rivalry and fakery, polygamy and playing favourites for example. Is there ANY hope for this world?

What is Genesis all about? Hope! If you need hope in your world, you need to journey through Genesis 12-35 with us this term, to see the hope of God’s blessings, through Abram and his dysfunctional family, to all the families of the earth. God decides not to give up on humanity but redeem it.God is transforming our relationships, promising blessing to the world through the agony of growing up in Abraham's family. This includes you and me. God, through Jesus Christ, is in the business of transforming us and our relationships.

A Study of Abraham's Family from the Book of Genesis.

Series Introduction

What do you think of Genesis? It’s the first book in the Bible. It means ‘the beginning’. The first sin... in chapter 3. Maybe you think of ‘The Fall’ of humanity, the problem of evil that begins in Genesis, or suffering, wondering where it comes from.

There’s Cain’s murder of Abel that follows in chapter 4, and then chapters 5-11 track a vicious spiral of sin and suffering – down all the generations and descendants of Adam, to Noah. We’re told in chapter 6 that it gets so bad, God agonised over people, the pinnacle of his creation:

The Lord saw how great the wickedness of the human race had become on the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil, all the time. The Lord regretted that he had made human beings on the earth, and his heart was deeply troubled.

Maybe when you hear ‘Genesis’, you think of the great flood that resulted from God’s agony: God’s judgement on the Human race. Perhaps you recall the Tower of Babel in chapter 11 – the peak of arrogance of humankind.

When I was 17, and they gave me a Bible, the only ‘Genesis’ I knew was the famous rock band with Phil Collins. I began to the read the Bible like any other book and I started at the beginning: Genesis. But it wasn’t long, before I was drowning.

Genesis was agonising. It’s full of abandonment and abuse, anxiety and anger, anguish and avoidance, barrenness and blaming. There’s childhood trauma, defensiveness and denial, emotional fusion, fear and famine, idolatry and judgement, lying and longing, manipulation and mocking, sibling rivalry and fakery, polygamy and playing favourites. There’s shaming. Slavery. Women’s subjugation. Sacrifice and secrecy, tension and triangulation. There’s sin everywhere and suffering all over the place! Even just reading chapters 1 to 11, I kept thinking: Is there ANY hope for this world?

But then the story slows right down and zooms in on one man. The rollercoaster ride hits chapter 12, God’s promises of hope:

The Lord had said to Abram, “Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you.

“I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you;
I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.
 I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse;
and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.”

What is Genesis all about? Hope! If you need hope in your world, you need to journey through Genesis 12-35 with us this term, to see the hope of God’s blessings, through Abram and his dysfunctional family, to all the families of the earth. Because God decides not to give up on humanity but redeem it. And he promises to Abram, around 4000 years ago, to do something about our sinful and suffering world, with him. Through Abram. And involving his family. God chooses to work both through, and despite, their dysfunction.

Here’re a few things to keep in mind, as we journey in ‘God’s Dysfunctional Family’. First, pick up on the Patterns. Relational patterns. In episode 1, for example, we see a pattern in Abram that reminds us of Adam. Each week we’ll look for patterns.

Second, in each episode we’ll consider Family Dysfunction. In episode 1 we see deception by Abram, manipulation of his wife, and the result in cursing instead of blessing.

Thirdly, we’ll also look for Healthy Relationships. For example, what Abram learns in the first episode with Pharaoh, challenges him to behave better with Lot, in the next. Because God’s got Abram on the agonising journey of growing up in his relationships.

To help us along the way, each week in our growth groups we’ll also look at a ‘Family Relationship Concept’. Episode 1, for example, teaches the Latin word ‘Angere’. It means ‘to constrict the blood flow – ‘can’t think straight’. We get 3 words from angere, that we’re all too familiar with: anger, anxiety and anguish. Abram reacts out of fear – anxiety. We want to see this in Abram, as well as God’s grace, and apply these concepts in our lives. See the table in the pages following.

God’s got Abram and his family on a journey. It’s the journey of growing up and getting healthy and being transformed – but he’s also on a physical journey from place to place. So, we’ve included a map to help you follow Abraham, Isaac and Jacob’s journey. We hope it’s helpful.

On the journey, you need to look out for altars, naming people and places. Don’t brush past these but slow down your reading. When someone builds an altar, this is huge in the story – so check the Bible footnotes to see what it means. When someone names another person in the ancient world, that was sacred, for to name someone was an expression of authority over them. (Keep that in mind for when God renames Jacob, to Israel.) Same for places. Often a place is named several times, and we need to ask why. Genesis is full of questions. We’ll learn together.

As well as the map, we’ve chucked in a ‘Cultural Differences’ table comparing our culture with Abram’s (our Modern West, with his Ancient Near East). They’re vastly different. That’s ok. In fact, it’s a good thing and will help us learn what God is doing in our lives, in our time. Check it out.

Here are 3 examples of cultural differences that we’ll explain along the way: the link between fertility and blessing, polygamy (having multiple wives) and polytheism – which means that what was normal back then was having multiple gods. Everyone had lots of gods. That Abram and his family would come to believe in just one God is the central and most radical idea that Genesis introduced to the world, and we take it for granted. Of course, God has now revealed himself to the world through Jesus – the One in whom all the promises of Abraham are being fulfilled.

Finally, in each episode, we’re not looking for the moral of the story. We’re not trying to pretend Abraham is perfect or to protect Rebekah from scrutiny. The story invites it! Don’t be afraid to ask the tough questions in Genesis. We’re not looking for a moral to the story but to learn from their mistakes, and to see God’s grace for our lives. This means that every episode will climax with what healthy identity and relationships look like, in Jesus.

Our big idea for the whole series is:

God is transforming our relationships, promising blessing to the world through the agony of growing up in Abraham's family.

This includes you and me. God, through Jesus Christ, is in the business of transforming us and our relationships. To bring blessing, so that we can be a blessing.

David Bailey (Rev) – Rose City
Other Series Contributors: Peter Evans (Rev)  – Stanthorpe, Nick Prins - Allora