God’s Agreement with Abram

15 After these things, the word of the Lord came to Abram in a special dream, saying, “Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your safe place. Your reward will be very great.” ² Then Abram said, “O Lord God, what will You give me? For I have no child. And the one who is to receive what belongs to me is Eliezer of Damascus.” ³ Abram said, “Because You have not given me a child, one born in my house will be given all I have.” ⁴ Then the word of the Lord came to him, saying, “This man will not be given what is yours. But he who will come from your own body will be given what is yours.” ⁵ He took him outside and said, “Now look up into the heavens and add up the stars, if you are able to number them.” Then He said to him, “Your children and your children’s children will be as many as the stars.” ⁶ Then Abram believed in the Lord, and that made him right with God.

⁷ God said to him, “I am the Lord Who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldeans to give you this land for your own.” ⁸ And Abram said, “O Lord God, how may I know that it will be mine?” ⁹ So the Lord said to him, “Bring Me a three-year-old cow, a three-year-old female goat, a three-year-old ram, a turtledove and a young pigeon.” ¹⁰ Then Abram brought all these to Him, and cut them in two. And he laid each half beside the other. But he did not cut the birds. ¹¹ When the meat-eating birds came down upon the dead animals, Abram made them go away.

¹² When the sun was going down, Abram went into a sleep as if he were dead. And much fear and darkness came upon him. ¹³ God said to Abram, “Know for sure that your children and those born after them will be strangers in a land that is not theirs. There they will be servants and suffer for 400 years. ¹⁴ But I will punish the nation they will serve. And later they will come out with many riches. ¹⁵ You will live many years, die in peace and be buried. ¹⁶ Then your great great-grandchildren will return here. For the sins of the Amorite are not yet finished.”

¹⁷ When the sun had gone down and it was very dark, a fire pot of smoke and a burning fire passed between these parts of animals. ¹⁸ The Lord made an agreement with Abram on that day. He said, “I have given this land to your children and to their children’s children, from the river of Egypt as far as the big Euphrates River, ¹⁹ the land of the Kenite, the Kenizzite, the Kadmonite, ²⁰ the Hittite, the Perizzite, the Rephaim, ²¹ the Amorite, the Canaanite, the Girgashite and the Jebusite.”