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サマリー
あらすじ・解説
Decisions have consequences, some good some bad. Our text is the story of Abraham. God tells Abram to depart from his family and that he will be the seed of a great nation. Abram obeys and goes to the land of Canaan. There, God repeats the promise, and Abram builds an altar. For some reason, Abram moves again and builds a second altar between Bethel and Ai. Our text ends with the statement that Abram continued moving south. Dr. Hughes explained that we do not know the location of the first altar or why Abram had decided to move from there. We do know that this continued to move south. The altar location between Bethel and Ai is significant. Bethel means the house of God. Ai is translated as "a heap of ruin." The Bible tells us that Abraham built the altar on a mountain overlooking Bethel and close to Ai. The choice to build here was comfortable. It was close to the house of God but not too close, and it was far enough away from the pile of ruin. The pile of ruin too easily influenced Abraham, and the house of God did not have enough influence. If our altars are in the wrong place, we risk allowing the evil of the world to creep into the church. Our decisions on where to build our altar can affect us, our families, and generations to come.