Take a moment to read the entire chapter of Genesis 14 before reading the devotional below.
Today we begin to grasp the breadth of the nations that have developed in Abram’s era. It’s amazing to see how civilizations and armies have been established, and we certainly don’t get all the historical details here. Remember, the Bible corresponds with history but is not meant to be a complete history book. We are tracing the history of the Jewish people which is captured here.
An important name appears in this chapter and again in Psalm 110 and Hebrews 7: Melchizedek. We don’t know much about him other than the fact that he was a king and a priest. Abram acknowledged him as such by giving him a tenth of everything he had, establishing the concept of a tithe. Recall that God has promised to use Abram to build a great nation for himself. This early foreshadowing of a mediator between mankind and God is central to the concept of Jesus as Messiah.
Here’s your freedom for today:
God is our source of victory.
Melchizedek gave Abram a blessing on behalf of God, a powerful statement of God’s provision and victory. Abram honored God with an offering. This exchange could not be direct because — as we know from Genesis 3 — sin had created a barrier between people and God. Melchizedek is the first biblical example of a mediator between a person and God, thus making him the ultimate example before Jesus of how people could offer sacrifices to God. We know that God had talked to Noah and to Abram, but the concept of a covenant (promise) and a sacrificial system is introduced here. This system will serve throughout the entire Old Testament as a symbol of the reality that we can never sacrifice enough to overcome our sin.