Read the Bible in a Year: Week 2

Chapter 12: God Calls Abram

Chapter 13: Lot and Abram Separate

Chapter 14: Abram Saves Lot + Melchizedek Blessing

Chapter 15: God Makes a Covenant with Abram

Chapter 16: Ishmael and Hagar

Chapter 17: Covenant Revised

Chapter 18: Three Visitors and a Child Promised

Chapter 19: Sodom and Gomorrah

Chapter 20: Abraham, Sarah and Abimelech

Chapter 21: Isaac and Ishmael

Chapter 22: Near Sacrifice of Isaac

Chapter 23: Sarah’s Death and Burial

Chapter 24: The Search for a Wife: Rebekah and Isaac

Chapter 25: The Next Generation

Chapter 26: Foreigners in a Land

Chapter 27: The Cheated Blessing: Jacob and Esau

Chapter 28: God is met on the Way

Chapter 29: Laban’s Deceit: Marriage of Jacob to Leah and Rachel

Chapter 30: Leah vs. Rachel and the Economics of Sheep

Chapter 31: Fleeing Family: Jacob returns home

This is the beginning of Israel's patriarchs, grouped around Abram (later called Abraham) (12-15) and Jacob (25-36) and Joseph (36-50).
God chooses one family to bless ALL families.
God works through and even blesses people outside of Abraham's promise (Hagar, Abimelek, Melchezideck, Pharaoh).
Abraham was righteous because of his faith in God and trust (not because of his upstanding moral character).
Covenant = an exchange of promises
Abraham bargains with God, asking what is justice? AND God engages him!
Sin of Sodom is NOT homosexuality (nowhere is there any mention about committed same sex relationship). The sin of Sodom is greed and attempted gang rape.
God blesses not only Isaac, but Ishmael too.
Several times the covenant God made with Abraham is threatened (when Sarah interferes with Hagar; when God tells Abraham to sacrifice Isaac, the heir of the promised covenant)
Family is complicated; moreover, God's promised family is very dysfunctional!