is what it says in Gen. 12: 2: "I will make of thee (Abram) a great nation and will bless

thee and make thy name great and thou shalt be a blessing. And I will bless them that

bless thee and curse him that curseth thee; and in thee, shall all families of the earth be

blessed." Let us try and understand these words because we are coming back to them

again and again in our studies. Later on in the N.T. we shall find that this promise is also

taken up by the N.T. writers.

Now who was this "seed of Abraham"? We know that Abraham had a son, Isaac, and

Isaac had a son, Jacob: Jacob had twelve sons and from these came the twelve tribes of

the children of Israel, the Jewish race as we now know it. They are the literal seed of

Abraham; but more than that, someone else was in mind Who also was a Son of

Abraham, and he was the Lord Jesus Christ (Matt. 1: 1). Was He in mind when God said

"and in thy Seed shall all families of the earth be blessed"?  Most certainly, because

Gal. 3: 6 says: `Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made." "And He

saith not, and to seeds (plural) as of many, but as of one. And to thy Seed which is

Christ." We are therefore right in saying that the Son of Abraham is the Lord Jesus

Christ, but should we be right in saying that He exhausts the prophesy concerning the

seed of Abraham? No, because at the end of the chapter we find others who are also

called Abraham's seed (verse 29) "And if ye (the Galatian believers) be Christ's, then are

ye Abraham's seed". So then Christ is Abraham's Seed and these Galatian believers

were Abraham's seed as well and `heirs according to the promise'.  Here is no

contradiction because they are "all of one" as the epistle to the Hebrews expresses it.

Christ and the literal seed of Abraham whom He had redeemed by His precious Blood are

looked on as one, a unity, in the plan. We are only getting half the truth if we say that it

refers only to Christ personally, or if we say that it refers to the people of Israel only.

Now not only do we read in the Scriptures about Abraham's seed, but also that they

are given by God an earthly home. So back again to the book of Genesis, this time to

chapter 13: 14-17.  Verse 14 says: "The Lord said to Abraham, after that Lot was

separated from him, lift up now thine eyes and look from the place where thou art,

northward, and southward, and eastward and westward, for all the land which thou seest,

to thee will I give it and to thy seed." Verse 17 says: "Arise, walk through the land in the

length of it and in the breadth of it for I will give it unto thee", and it is described later on,

geographically, in chapter 15:, "from the river of Egypt (the River Nile) unto the great

river, the River Euphrates".  One cannot spiritualize a literal piece of land like this

(Gen. 15: 18). And we find God not only made this promise to Abraham, but to Isaac.

In Gen. 26: 3 and 4: "Sojourn in this land and I will be with thee and I will bless thee;

for unto thee and unto thy seed will I give all these countries." Verse 4: "I will make thy

seed to multiply as the stars of heaven and will give unto thy seed all these countries",

now note: "and in thy seed shall all nations of the earth be blessed". So here is the same

promise repeated to Isaac, and then to Jacob in chapter 28: Jacob greatly valued this

and planned to get it by any means possible, whether fair means or foul, but God does not

need help like that, and in the end he got it not by deception but by sheer grace. This is

what it says in Gen. 28: 13, 14: "Behold the Lord stood above it" (where this man

was laid down to sleep), and he saw Him (the Lord in a vision)--"I am the Lord God of

Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac: the land whereon thou liest to thee will I give