All over the world, men in blood-covenants were ready to give what was dearest to them [life itself] to their Blood-brothers or their gods.

..................Abraham proved he would do as much for his Divine Friend. Abraham surrendered to his God all that the worshippers of other gods were willing to surrender to prove their devotedness.

For Abraham to surrender his own old, worn-out life after having his promised son, Isaac,, born to him, would have been easy.

...........But for him to surrender his only son and to become a childless, old man again would be something much different.

......Only faith that wouldn't reason or question;
......only love that wouldn't waver or fail,
......could do what he was asked to do.

Genesis 22:1-2 "And it came to pass that God did prove Abraham and said unto him, Abraham; and he said Here am I. And He said, Take now thy son, thy only son whom thou lovest, even Isaac, and get thee into the land of Moriah and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I tell you of."

........................And Abraham rose early to respond to the call of his Friend.

After the covenant of blood had been cut between God and Abraham; there came a testing of Abraham's faithfulness to the Covenant.

................This test was proof to future generations that his cutting of the covenant with God hadn't been some empty ceremony.

He had pledged his very life to Jehovah.

Genesis 17:24 "And Abraham was ninety years old and nine, when he was circumcised. . . . .
26 In the selfsame day. . . ."

...............He bore the evidence that he had entered into the Blood Covenant of friendship with God.

He is still known as the 'friend of God' in the East.

God gave Abraham the method of cutting the Covenant.
Read Genesis 17:10-14

....The seal of the Covenant was Circumcision.

Every male child was circumcised at the age of eight days and that circumcision was the entrance into the covenant.

The Covenant that God cut with Abraham was to bring the Israeli nation into being as a Covenant people.

.............................Genesis 17:7
"And I will establish my covenant between me and thee and thy seed after thee in their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be a God unto thee, and to thy seed after thee."

We see that when God appeared to Abraham to make a covenant with him, that Abraham knew what it meant.

....................God was coming into a covenant of strong friendship with him.
[The Blood Covenant was called the Covenant of Strong Friendship.]

That is why Abraham was called the friend of God.
James 2:23; Isaiah 41:8 and 2 Chronicles 20:7

In Africa and a few other countries, if two men want to cut the blood covenant; they come together with friends and a priest.

.....................................First, they exchange gifts. Then they take the wine they brought and the priest makes an incision in the arm of each man. It is allowed to drip into the cup of wine.

........Then they stir the blood in the wine and drink it. This makes them blood brothers.

The method of cutting the blood covenant is almost the same all over the world.

In some places it has deteriorated into a very strange ritual, but it is the same blood covenant.

Happy

Thanksgiving 2011

There is nothing that is absolutely sacred with us.

........But in Africa the Covenant is sacred.

..................Mr Stanley and Dr Livingstone both testify that they never knew of the Covenant to be broken.

Mr Stanley and Dr Livingstone said that if two men in Africa cut a blood covenant and one of them should break the Covenant, his closest relatives would seek his death.

...................No man can live in Africa who breaks the Covenant; he curses the ground.

The blood covenant goes down through the generations; it is a permanent covenant that generations cannot erase.

...................If a man cuts this covenant with his friend, the children of the two families are bound to it.

Once the blood covenant is celebrated, every thing that a Blood Covenant man owns is at the disposal of this blood-brother.

......But this brother would never ask for anything unless he were in desparate need.

There are three reasons men cut blood covenants:

..........If a strong tribe lives by the side of a weaker tribe, and there is danger of the weaker tribe being destroyed, the weaker tribe will seek to cut the covenant with the stronger tribe so that they will not be destroyed.

Or, if two men went into business together, a matter of trust.

Or, if two men honored one another like David and Jonathan.

A covenant of blood;
.....a covenant made by mixing blood;
..........has been recognized as the closest,
..........the holiest and
..........the most permanent and
..........undo able agreement conceived.

Once made it cannot be undone.

The mixing of blood has been understood as the same as the mixing of natures.

...........Two natures, combined by the mixing of blood, has been considered as forming one nature, one life, one soul.

...............The union of natures by the mixing of blood has been considered possible between man and man, and Deity and man.

From the very beginning in every nation, Blood seems to have been looked upon in a pecular sense as life itself.

.....................The transference of blood from one to another has been counted as the transference of life with all that that life includes.

To understand the importance of this Covenant which God cut with Abraham, we must know the meaning of the Blood Covenant.

...............The existence of Blood Covnanting have been found among peoples of every corner of the globe.

...............................There are signs of it dating long before the days of Abraham.

Twenty-five years after Abraham had received his call from God, the greatest event in human history [except for the birth of Christ] took place.

It was the Blood Covenant which Abraham entered into with Jehovah God.

Abraham's father, family and neighbors were idolators.

..............................If God was to find a nation in Abraham to preserve His revelation to man and a knowledge of man's redeemer, so that He would be recognized when He came; God needed to remove him from these influences.

.................So following God, he set out in search of a land where a nation could be started free from idlolatry. (Genesis 12)

We can see why God revealed Himself to Abraham.

......The Revelation of God was practically lost.

..............If a righteous line were to be preserved so God could sent man a Savior, He had to choose a man who knew Him; and then make a nation of him that would preserve the knowledge of Himself on the earth.

367 years after the flood, Abraham appears.

Noah lived for 50 years after Abraham was born.

.........The world had slipped into idolatry. Abraham lived with pagans, and idolators until he was 75 years old. He had lived in Ur of the Chaldees until God called him to leave.

Many of the nations oldest and sacred books witness to the account in the bible Romans 1:18-32; that each nation originally had a revelation of God.

...................From these ancient writings we get a picture of the passing from the worship of one God into the worship of many gods and then into the worship of idols.

After the people of Babel had been scattered, their worship and knowledge of Jehovah God passed into the worship of the power of nature; then into idols.

Sense knowledge [that had been given to spiritually dead man] took the place of God's Revelation knowledge.

In Genesis 11:7-9.... Jehovah came down and confounded the languages of those living in Babel.

............It caused them to scatter all over the earth. From there the populations poured into all parts of the world.

..It took ages for the more distant lands to be settled.

Tower of Babel
These people decided upon the plain of Shinar as their permanent settlement so they could build a city and a tower, that they might not be scattered abroad upon the face of the earth
.....(Genesis 11:4).

In the ninth chapter of Genesis a command had been given to replenish the earth.

In the eleventh chapter of Genesis the whole earth was speaking one language.

...............As they began to multiply, where they were living no longer was sufficient. They either had to separate and fill the earth as God said or find a territory that would hold them together. So they moved into the rich, fertile plain of Shinar (Genesis 11:2).

From the time of the flood until the building of the tower of Babel, there was worship of God.

...............Not every one accepted it. Many wickedly rebelled but the knowledge and revelation of the true God was too fresh in their minds for them to set up other gods.