WAIT. THEY LOVE OUR GOD, TOO?

¹⁸ Then Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine; he was the priest of God Most High.

¹⁹ And he blessed him and said:“Blessed be Abram of God Most High, Possessor of heaven and earth;

²⁰         And blessed be God Most High, Who has delivered your enemies into your hand.” And he gave him a tithe of all. (Genesis 14:18-20)

Two kings met Abram as he was returning from the rescue mission that freed his nephew Lot:  the king of Sodom and the king of Salem (Genesis 14: 17, 18).    The king of Sodom asked Abram to give him the people he’d taken out of captivity.  Abram told him to kick rocks (Genesis 14: 22-23).  Melchizedek king of Salem, as far as we can tell, didn’t ask Abram for anything.  Instead, he brought

food for Abram and his rescue squad.  Abram gave him 10% of his treasure.

Slow down.  Process that.

Two kings.  One (Sodom) we’d heard of before.  The other (Melchizedek) shows up for the first time out of nowhere in the Biblical record.  Abram the Hebrew patriarch of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, deferred to the new guy, and even paid his tithes to him.  Jews don’t tithe to pagan priests.

This Canaanite king, this Melchizedek was priest to the same God Abram served. 

The meeting with Melchizedek means that before Abraham,  there was an entire kingdom in Canaan already worshipping the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Jesus.

Monotheism didn’t begin with the Jews.   God was in the land before Abraham got there.

Soon after these things (Genesis 15:1) God reiterated his promises to the patriarch.  In that vision, the Lord prophesied the Jews’ captivity in Egypt and explained why it would take 400 years.

But in the fourth generation they shall return here, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete.”  (Genesis 15:16)

In Genesis 15, the Canaanites hadn’t yet totally abandoned the worship of God – the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Jesus.  For 5 centuries, God gave them space to repent, but by Moses’ day, their apostasy was complete/ full.  That’s why the Lord sent Israel to displace the Amorites and other -ites of Canaan.  Yes, because He’d promised the land it Abraham; but also because by idolatry, the -ites had rejected Melchizedek’s preaching and forfeited their Divine rights to the land.

That’s why God warned the Israelites against adopting Canaanite culture.

Do not defile yourselves with any of these things; for by all these the nations are defiled, which I am casting out before you. For the land is defiled; therefore I visit the punishment of its iniquity upon it, and the land vomits out its inhabitants. (Leviticus 18: 24-25)

But even in judgment against the land, God always saves a remnant among his children and not just among his Abrahamic children.

Remember Moses’ father-in-law.  Jethro, aka Reuel,  was a Kenite and a Midianite.  His dual-ethnicity tied him to multiple idolatrous Canaanite cultures, but Jethro wasn’t a pagan.  Like Melchizedek, Jethro the Kenite-Midianite was a priest to the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Jesus (Exodus 3:1). 

Melchizedek’s faith had survived 500 years of idolatry.   In Genesis 14, Melchizedek  met and refreshed Abraham.  In the next chapter, God formalized the Covenant with Abraham.   In Exodus chapter 2 Jethro met and refreshed Moses.   Moses encountered the burning bush in chapter 3.

2 points:

1.      God has true worshippers in every ethnicity and nationality. 

And other sheep I have which are not of this fold (John 10: 16). 

2.       Those of us who (think we) trace our ecclesiastical lineage directly to the apostles and patriarchs need to dial back the pride. 

Now John answered Him, saying, “Teacher, we saw someone who does not follow us casting out demons in Your name, and we forbade him because he does not follow us.”

³⁹ But Jesus said, “Do not forbid him, for no one who works a miracle in My name can soon afterward speak evil of Me. ⁴⁰ For he who is not against us is on our side. (Mark 9: 38-39)

Scripture implies that one day we’re going to need to be refreshed by those other guys, the ones from “those countries” who despite their culture still worship the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Jesus.

They won't look, sound, dress, or worship like you're used to, but being strange to you doesn't mean they're strangers to God.    Do not forbid them.  

 

Methodists, Baptist, Presbyterian, Unitarians, Jews, Muslims, and Community Agencies at Miles Chapel CME Church all working together to make the community better.

---Anderson T. Graves II   is a writer, community organizer and consultant for education, ministry, and rural leadership development.

Rev. Anderson T. Graves II is pastor of Miles Chapel CME Church in Fairfield, Alabama;  executive director of the Substance Abuse Youth Networking Organization (SAYNO);  and director of rural leadership development for the National Institute for Human Development (NIHD).

Subscribe to my personal blog  www.andersontgraves.blogspot.com .

Email atgravestwo2@aol.com

Friend me at www.facebook.com/rev.a.t.graves

Follow me on twitter @AndersonTGraves 

You can help support this ministry with a donation to Miles Chapel CME Church.

You can help support Rev. Graves’ work by visiting his personal blog and clicking the DONATE button on the right-hand sidebar.

Support by check or money order may be mailed to 

Miles Chapel CME Church

P O Box 132

Fairfield, Al 35064