Moving into a Strange Country - Brueggemann Part 3

This post continues the reflection on Genesis chapter 12:1-9 and Walter Brueggemann's commentary on Genesis.  I quoted and discussed  the text of Genesis 12:1-8  in a  previous post  and won't repeat that here.   In response to God's call Abraham  has  moved out from his home country without knowing where he was going.  This is all about the biblical theme of the journey:  "And Abram journeyed on, still going toward the Negeb."  Gen 12:9 (RSV).

Commenting on Genesis 12 and the idea of the journey Brueggemann writes:

The metaphor of journey or sojourn is a radical one.  It is a challenge to the dominant ideologies of our time which yearn for settlement, security, and placement.  The life of this family [of Abraham and Sarah] is matched by the way of Yahweh himself.  Thus Yahweh is understood not as a God who settles and dwells, but as a God who sojourns and moves about (II Sam. 7:4-6).  In the David tradition which protests against royal absolutism, Yahweh is presented as a God who is known especially in his lordly freedom. This family is called to the same kind of freedom marked by precariousness and danger, the same risk Yahweh himself takes by sojourning with Israel. ...

The metaphor of journey as a way of speaking about faith is utilized by the New Testament in important ways.  Christian discipleship is understood as a following of "the way" (Matt. 8:22; 9:9; 10:38).  The "way" as a metaphor is not precisely characterized, but it is variously the way of Jesus, the way of the cross, the way of suffering, the way to Jerusalem.  The term marks Christians as those who live in a way contrasted to every fixed and settled form of life.   ...  "The way" clearly brought the early church into conflict with all the false ways of self-securing. ...   
In the great recital of pilgrimage in Heb. 11, Abraham and Sarah are presented as people who claimed no home.  They only pursued a risky promise. 
Brueggemann at 122.

Last night from my backyard  in Mayville
setting sun pouring through the high level  clouds

In Hebrews the NT writer cites Abraham  to encourage new believers in Jesus: "By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place which he was to receive as an inheritance; and he went out, not knowing where he was to go."  Heb. 11:8 (RSV).  And when Abraham arrived in this place, it was not like home.  He was there as a sojourner, living in tents:  "By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise."  Heb. 11:9 (RSV).    Hebrews is a message to a young church of Jewish people who believed in Jesus and were suffering persecution.   They were a people called to faith with Jesus as their Messiah.  Like Abraham and Sarah these new believers were sent out on a journey - in their case a spiritual journey -  based on the promise of God.  These Jewish believers, now suffering for their Christian faith,  felt like strangers in a foreign country, like Abraham in Canaan.

Next post I will discuss more of what the believer can expect from this life of the journey, with an illustration from the experience of St. Paul.