Quick Summary:

It's that place where choice determines destiny. The point where the rays of the compass converge--the CROSSROADS. Images from the 9.0 earthquake, the subsequent tsunami point toward a major crossroads for Japan as it faces its greatest challenge since WW2.

Crossroads. We've been there before—nationally, communally, personally—and we'll be there again. And this morning, that's exactly where we find Abram and Sarai in our First Testament text. By the 11th chapter of Genesis, God’s mistake-prone creature seems to have reached the end of the story. For there, [11:30] as we meet Abram and his wife Sarai for the very first time, and we read that she has no child, that her womb is, in fact, incapable of bearing children. With this announcement it becomes clear that no way exists, within human capacity, to move this story forward. But then God breathes a word of new beginning in chapter 12:
The LORD said to Abram, GO FROM YOUR COUNTRY & KINDRED & FATHER’S HOUSE AND I WILL MAKE YOU A NATION, AND YOU WILL BE A BLESSING. And Abram went.

Thomas Cahill, author of The Gifts of the Jews, calls these words “two of the boldest words in all literature.” ABRAM WENT. This very human story continues to address each new generation which finds itself at a crossroads with choices to make about the future.