Introduction:

Believe, Respond, Obey

When we are learning to do something, it is always helpful to have

someone al~er whom to model our actions. Having a prototype will

get us started, and from there we can adapt our role model s actions

to our own pace. That s what we propose to do in this book.

In learning how to walk with God, let s take a dose, long walk

with a man who dominates the Old Testament. He is, in fact, men-

tioned seventy-three times in the New Testament, more than any

other Old Testament figure. He s one of the central figures of the

entire Scripture, related not only to those of the Old Covenant, but

to those in the New as well. Without knowledge of him, I dare say

that we do not completely know who we are. I m referring to Abra-

ham.

Abraham towers at the very beginning of the Scripture as a man

whom God sought out amidst the whole of the earth. He touched that

man and entered into a covenant with him, a covenant that has so

firmly bound the Lord God to His people that thereafter He was

known as "the Lord, the God of Abraham"

An important statement was made in the hook of Isaiah:

Listen to Me, you who follow after righteouaness,/You who

seek the LOgD:/Look to the rock from which you were hewn/

And to the hole of the pit from which you were dug./Look to

Abraham your father. (Isa. 51:1,2)

Often in the book of Isaiah, it is as if the Lord God is really trying to

get our attention. "Listen to Me, you stubborn-hearted,/Who are

far from righteousness" (46:12). And, "Hear this, O house of