One line that caught my eye was Gen 15:16 "In the fourth generation, your descendants will come back here, for the sin of the Amorites has not reached its full measure." I wondered what God meant by this. I found the footnote in the Concordia Study Bible to offer insight.
In 1929 archaeological artifacts and literature (the Raj Shamra tablets) were discovered on the north coast of Syria which shed light on just how sinful many Canaanite religious practices were. Their "worship" was polytheistic and included child sacrifice, idolatry, religious prostitution and divination.
Here Amorites is a general term for the nations who lived in Canaan. These descendants of Canaan, Ham’s son, were wicked and cursed by God. But the Lord was working with them and his patience had not run out. However, when their sin and unrepentance had gone on long enough, God would use the Israelites to punish them. The 4 generations was the "time of grace" for the Amorites. God was showing his mercy by giving them 4 generations to repent and turn from their wicked ways.
Very interesting, Bob. I'm glad you talked about that because that caught my eye as well. You see a similar type of patient endurance and mercy with Israel (as we'll read mid-year)--just as God showed with the world before the flood. He waits and waits for repentance but that time is limited.
ReplyDeleteCan't help but wonder how long God will be patient with America.
ReplyDeleteI often wonder the same thing as Justin. But given what we read in the Bible, people must have felt the same way throughout the ages. God is indeed patient with us!
ReplyDeleteThat's another interesting thing I heard in Bible class this morning (it was a really good Bible class). The pastor said the US, from 1960 to today, has had a significant culture/worldview shift from Judeo-Christian values to basically pagan/secular. What usually takes a nation a couple hundred years has taken us about 50. This has been helped along by technology (everything is faster paced).
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