Gen 15 1-12, 17-18, ps 27 Luke 13 31-end.
 
What must it have been like for Abram, God telling him that he would be the father of a great nation, and his descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky? In our light polluted world, we see few stars in our night sky, but when I was sailing in the Indian Ocean, and the ship was blacked out, because of the pirates , the night sky was amazing, we saw so many stars the it was difficult to see any individual star, this made the  promise God gave Abraham  impressive. Especially as he had not any children of his own and Sari was old and past the normal time of child bearing, but Abram trusted God in spite of all the odds stacked against him.
How long would we continue to trust that God would keep his promises to us? We’ve all lived through anxious times when we were not sure if the path we were following was really the one chosen for us by God. For many years I had wanted to become a doctor, the odds seemed stacked up against me, my parents, for various reasons, were reluctant to let me apply for medical school,  the first time I could have applied I did not, the next year when it was nearly the closing date for applications, they suddenly said I could apply, then within about a month, I had a place. Abram had to wait much longer; he must have felt that God was never going to fulfil his promise. 
 Then God appeared before Abram again, still with no promise of a son soon. Although by then he had a child Ishmael by his slave girl, but he was still being told he would have many descendents, from his own and Sari’s off spring. Abram was now 99 years old   God then told Abram that he was no longer to be Abram but Abraham, and Sarai was to be known as Sarah,

What’s in a name? When parents are expecting a baby, one of the most important decisions they make is the name they are going to give to the baby, often they look up the meaning in a book of names. 
Names are important, often names have a period of popularity, and you can get a good idea of a person’s age by their name such as Che, Dean, many people regret the names they have been given by their parents, and want to change it, fortunately many are given two names so they often prefer to use their second name, which causes confusion when they are admitted to hospital and get registered under their first name, as it gets difficult to find them
God on several occasions choose to change, peoples names to give them a greater significance   why did God change Abram’s name?  Abram means father of height, whilst Abraham means father of multitudes, showing that God was going to keep his promise. Sarai’s name meant Jah is prince to Sarah which means princess. Abraham’s grandson Jacob, which means usurper, or supplanter, as he took away his twin brother Esau birthright, his name was changed to Israel, after he fought with God at the river Jabbok, Israel means ruling with God. As he had striven with God and prevailed. Jesus changed some of the disciple’s names such as Simon which means hearing to Peter which means stone or a rock.
The genealogy of Jesus in Luke starts with ,  Abraham ,through many generations to  Jesus  so not only did Jesus descend from Abraham, but all three monotheistic religions, relate to Abraham, as their  founder , beginning with Judaism, next to Christianity and then to Islam, and all three claim Jerusalem as their Holy city. In the Dome of the Rock, a very beautiful building, which unfortunately we can no longer visit. In side the building which is now a mosque, there is a rock which is thought to be Mount Moriah where Abraham was asked to take Isaac, to be sacrificed.  This is on the temple mount, where David built the Temple, now only the Wailing Wall or western wall is left as a site where the Jews can pray. The whole area is sacred to all three religions.     
It was not until twenty five years later when Abraham and Sarah must have begun to wonder whether God was really going to fulfil his promise of a son,
Then Abraham suddenly saw three strangers coming towards him, it was a hot day and he was ready to take a rest, but as was the custom he immediately offered hospitality.
 David Kossoff, many will remember him reading his Bible stories, with his distinctive gravelly voice, those too young to remember him, would find his book “The Old and the New Bible stories retold” very enlightening; he tells the story of the visit of the angels, coming to tell Abraham that he would have a son before they returned next year. He says “Now, Abraham and Sarah lived rather quietly in their old age, so Abraham was rather surprised one day when three rather tired hungry-looking people suddenly came round the house. He just looked up and there they were. Surprised or not, Abraham knew the laws of hospitality. He made the men come and rest in the garden. He had a servant bring water so they could wash and refresh themselves. He asked them whether they would like to eat in the garden and arranged that a good meal was prepared. While they waited for the food to arrive he and the three men talked together. They gave no details of where they were from but said they were on their way to the two towns’ of Sodom and Gomorrah. Abraham began to have a strange feeling, but before he could say anything the tall man said “where is Sarah your wife? “ Abraham blinked. He hadn’t mentioned Sarah’s name. At that moment Sarah was just bringing the food out. She heard her name and stopped. Just inside the house, Unseen. The tall man then said,” we shall pass this way next spring and Sarah shall have a son “Abraham was now sure that his visitors were from God and he sat silent. And so did they. And into that silence they heard old Sarah laugh. A sad sort of laugh, with tears in it. The tall man got up and helped Sarah and the servant bring in the food. When the servant had gone, he said gently, “Sarah is anything too hard for God? Why did you laugh?” Sarah was about to laugh again, then she looked up at the tall man’s face and didn’t.”
When we offer hospitality to strangers we never know when we might meet angels unaware
The hospitality of Abraham is also reflected in Rublev’s Icon,   In this icon the three messengers or angels , are the angels are coming to tell Abraham that by this time, they would return next year Sarah would  have a son,
God’s promise at last fulfilled, but this Icon leads us further on towards Christianity, with the three angels forming a triangle.
Did Rublev see this as the moment when the gradual build up to the revelation of the mystery of the incarnation began, certainly now this Icon  shows not only the hospitality of Abraham but is also a depiction of the Holy Trinity,  Christ seated at the centre pointing to the chalice, the Spirit to his right and the Father to his left, Christ points to the chalice of wine , symbolising his death, and the Eucharist which would continue, the commemoration of  the mystery of his death .
Abraham must have felt that God had tested him enough, by delaying giving him , his much wanted son , but God tested his trust in him again, by asking him to sacrifice his son, although Abraham obeyed, fortunately God provided another offering, a ram. Abraham’s trust was absolute, no wonder God called him righteous.
Families are very important to us all, without a family we can drift, fortunately we usually have two families, our blood family and our Christian family, both help us to root ourselves firmly, to enable us to use our gifts fully in the way we have been given them by God, may we always use them wisely. Amen