Privates and Bridle Repair

I was thinking about the movie Braveheart the other day and specifically about the scene where the armies are lined up against each other getting ready to get to it. All of a sudden it occurred to me that I had always thought of myself as being one of the guys in the front row, mooning the enemy with William Wallace. But there were thousands of men in that army and more than likely, had I been there, I would have been back in the pack somewhere with my little shield and sword, not knowing anything, just standing there cheering for whatever the guys up front were doing.

Then I got to thinking about how much agreement there was between the guys in the back and the guys in charge about any of the battle plans or camp plans or pretty much anything of real significance. The “privates” in most armies know nothing and agree to nothing. They simply follow directions. In a sense, they’re “just happy to be here.”

Then I got to thinking about Abram in the Bible. God comes to him in Genesis 12 and says, 

Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed (Gen 50:1-3).

There’s no discussion at all. God doesn’t ask Abram what he thinks about this great idea. He just tells him to pack everything up and go. And Abram doesn’t say, “I’ll have to go home and talk it over with my wife and the rest of the gang.” God just pops in and tells Abram to get a move on and go…and he does.

But back to my Braveheart thought.

The text says, “So Abram departed as the Lord had spoken to him.” It’s tempting to think that Abram just went home and packed up Sarai and put it in their station wagon and off they went. But no, “And Abram took Sarai his wife, and Lot his brother’s son, and all their possessions that they had gathered, and the people that they had acquired in Haran, and they set out to go to the land of Canaan (Gen 12:5). The text doesn’t tell us exactly how many people Abram had with him on this journey, but in the next chapter, it says that he was very rich in livestock, silver, and gold. It also says that Lot was also very rich. So rich in fact that they had to split up so that the land could handle the crowd. In the 14th chapter, it says that Lot and his stuff were captured and hauled off and Abram took his personal army, which consisted of 318 trained men, to rescue Lot. I say all this to point out that Abram had hundreds maybe thousands of people with him when he lit out from Haran.

I always think I would have been Abram. But at best, I probably would have been one of the guys who fixed horse bridles. Not even a trained soldier. But here’s the thing, do I think, when God told Abram to go to the land he would show him, that Abram would have come to me, the bridle repairer, and let me know what the plan was and get my permission or even my blessing to do it? Somehow, I don’t think so.

God came to Abram and said, “It’s time for you to get all your belongings and move to another place. I’m going to bless you and everything you own for eternity.” And Abram said, “Okay.” And he would have turned to his overseers and told them to get everything packed up and ready to go. “You’ll find out where we’re going later.” And that would have included all the bridle fixers and privates in the army.

Abram was 75 when all this happened.

Later, when Abram was ninety-nine years old, God came to him again and told him some more about the covenant. Part of this was a name change. No longer Abram, now Abraham. Some of this was the continuation of his family line; Isaac, Jacob…Jesus. The most important part for our discussion was the new “sign of the covenant,” which was a sign worn on members of the human side of the covenant that was to be a constant reminder of the relationship they had with God which would result in the salvation of the world—circumcision. Hey, wait! Couldn’t we just wear our hair in a funky new way?

Regarding the formation of the covenant given that warm June day in the 99^th year of Abraham’s life God said, 

As for you, you shall keep my covenant, you and your offspring after you throughout their generations. This is my covenant, which you shall keep, between me and you and your offspring after you: Every male among you shall be circumcised. You shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskins, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you. He who is eight days old among you shall be circumcised. Every male throughout your generations, whether born in your house or bought with your money from any foreigner who is not of your offspring, both he who is born in your house and he who is bought with your money, shall surely be circumcised. So shall my covenant be in your flesh an everlasting covenant. Any uncircumcised male who is not circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin shall be cut off from his people; he has broken my covenant (Gen 17:9-14).

Now again, when I read this and others like it, I assume that either I am Abraham or that maybe Abraham gathered everyone up and had a chat with them about what was happening to them.

Remember that Abram was 75 when God first came to him and already had hundreds maybe thousands of people with him. Now, he is 99. He must have gathered several thousand by this time. And the text says,

So Abraham took Ishmael his son, all who were born in his house and all who were bought with his money, every male among the men of Abraham’s house, and circumcised the flesh of their foreskins that very same day, as God had said to him. Abraham was ninety-nine years old when he was circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin. And Ishmael his son was thirteen years old when he was circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin. That very same day Abraham was circumcised, and his son Ishmael; and all the men of his house, born in the house or bought with money from a foreigner, were circumcised with him (Gen 17:23–27).

He might have gathered them together in a group and told them what was going on, but somehow, I doubt it. I tend to read my own circumstances into history. Because we do this in our day, we usually think all leaders discussed big decisions with those the decision impacted. But even we don’t do that in the military. The captain just comes in and says, “Well, boys! We’re off to war!” and off you go. In the same way that William Wallace didn’t ask the private in the third row what he thought about the battle plans, I don’t think Abraham asked the guy who fixed harnesses what he thought about being circumcised. He just gathered everyone together and had his doctors slice away. 

As I read the rest of Scripture, this seems to be the way all the covenantal relationships and governmental relationships work. What the head of a group did had an immediate and strong impact on those who were under his headship. And what the people did, had an immediate and strong impact on the leader. There is a dramatic effect for members of covenants.

Notice this also, there are no covenantal relationships that don’t involve people groups. That is, there are no covenants for individuals. There isn’t Abram or Abraham all by himself. It is always, “you and your household.” When we come into a relationship with God, it is always, “you and your household.” And in the Bible, household meant everyone associated with you and what you were doing: spouses, children, grandchildren, slaves, other kinds of servants, people who just live with you, or even in your community. And when there is a sign of the covenant, everyone who can get the sign, of a particular covenant group, gets the sign. And they don’t need to know what is going on to receive the sign.

So, 1,000 years after Abraham, small 8-day-old baby boys were still having their foreskin cut off because they were members of the covenant that God made with Abraham and his seed after him. And this is also true of the descendants of those who were simply harness repair guys not even related to Abraham but were members of that original household. What happened to the leader happened to those under the leader, whether they knew what was going on or not.

This understanding of Covenant membership needs to be at the forefront of our minds when we read the New Testament and think about membership in the New Covenant with its accompanying sign. We’re all just privates and bridle repairers.