Who is God? In Genesis 17 ...
He is the great initiator who approaches and appears. (verse 1) 
He declares "I am God Almighty," and invites us to walk before Him blameless and without blemish.  (verse 2)  
As we bow in worship, He speaks covenant promise over us.  (verses 3-4) 
He reveals His name even as He changes our name. (verse 5)   
He initiates and establishes covenants that are everlasting. (verse 7) 
He is the God who knows what I will choose to do.  (verse 9) 
When His promise is greeted by laughter, He heart is still to bless and to give.  (verses 16-17) 
As we tell Him why He can't keep His promise, He establishes what is everlasting.  (verse 19) 
He is the beginning and end of every conversation.  (verse 22)

Prayer - 
Oh Father,  I long to be blameless before you and worthy of covenant trust.  I tremble because my response to your invitation affects generations of those who come after me.  You have made it so clear, "walk before me and be blameless."  Oh Father, forgive me when instead I walk away.  Where can I go from your Spirit?  What choice can I make  that is not already known by you?  I am prone to wander, and known to laugh at your promise.  No more wandering, no more laughter, only more of you.

Who is God? In Genesis 16 ...
He allows us to choose who it is that we listen to.  (verse 2) 
He allows us to take matters into our own hands, and pay the consequences for generations to come.  (verse 4)  
He even sends His angels to those we have mistreated.  (verse 7) 
He commands us to submit to earthly authority.  (verse 9)  
He listens to our affliction.  (verse 11)  
He is the God of seeing, and allows us to see his care for us.  (verse 13)

Prayer - 
Oh Father, convict me of any voice that has your place in my heart.  Forgive my murmuring when I pay the price for going my own way.  Strengthen me for the discipline I endure.  Thank you for caring for those I mistreat.  I bow before your authority and any authority you place me under.  Hear my cry oh God.  Comfort me with your insight.  Give me glimples of your care for me.

Who is God? In Genesis 15...
He continues to reveal His character and purposes as we walk with Him.  (verse 1) 
He commands us not to fear, because He is our shield and reward.  (verse 1) 
He brings us to a place where we can look up and see what He has spoken into being.  (verse 5)  
He shows us hope that is beyond our ability to count or comprehend.  (verse 5) 
When we believe Him, He declares that we are righteous.  (verse 6) 
He desires that we know for certain who holds the future.  (verse 13) 
He decrees and brings judgement.  (verse 14)  
After we believe, He answers our questions with a visible covenant.  (verse 18)

Prayer:
Oh Father, thank you for walking with me and revealing who you are along the way.  This is reason enough to journey with you!  Fear has no place in my heart in light of my shield and reward.  Oh the delight of looking up and not being able to count what you have spoken into being.  Thank you for showing me the familiar and visible, to help me trust the invisible. I believe You, and receive right standing from you alone.   Thank you for encounters that begin with a question, and end with a covenant.

Who is God? In Genesis 14, 
Earthly rulers plan and wage war, but His purposes prevail.  
He allows us to settle in a place of sin, but there is a day of reckoning. 
The enemy may think that they have captured everyone and everything, but He causes one to escape and bring deliverance.   
He asks us to pursue people regardless of the choices they have made. 
He honors the hard work of training for battle.  
He is able to rescue and redeem everything that was stolen away.  
As He rescues, it demonstrates that He is the creator and possessor of heaven and earth. 
As we give Him a tenth, we declare that He is our creator and possessor. 
When our enemies are delivered into our hands, it is because of Him. 

Prayer:
Oh Father, I rest under your prevailing purposes.  You are greater than any ruler or war.  Show me any place where I am settling for less than your best.  Open my eyes to any pit that I have moved near.  I wander and settle, and need rescue, but I look up and see you. 

Now train me for rescue Oh God.  Grant me your joy of purusing the undeserving, and seeing the look of freedom on their face.  I gladly give a tenth of everything to God Most High, my possessor, my redeemer. 

Who is God? In Genesis 13, 
All of the livestock, silver, and gold that we possess, really belongs to Him.  
He brings us back to places where we worshipped Him long ago.  
He is Holy and our sin is against Him.  
He invites us to lift up our eyes and see what He has prepared for us.  
His blessing extends to generations. 
He invites us to walk through the length and the breadth of what He has prepared for us.  

Prayer:
Father, all that I have is a gift from you.  All of the gold and silver belongs to you.  Show me any place of worship that I need to return to.  Help me to remember things spoken long ago.  I could lift my eyes and choose for myself, but I choose you.  I can try to justify my sin, but it is against you.  I hear your invitation to lift my eyes in worship, and wonder at what you have prepared for me and my children.  Oh, the length and breadth of your promise.  Oh, the joy of walking with you.

Who is God?
He tells us what we need to leave behind in order to follow Him. 
As we lose sight of what we love the most, we find Him. 
He invites us to begin a journey without knowing where we are going. 
He bestows blessing and greatness so that we become a blessing.
He establishes a people that will mediate divine blessing to all the families of the earth.
He responds to obedience with further revelation.  
He calls us to build places of worship.
His purposes are greater than our doubt or deception. 

Prayer:
Father, it is my great honor to follow You into the unknown.  I trust you.  You are beyond any country, kindred, or house, that I leave behind.  Hear my cry to be blessed, and to be a blessing.   Show me any area of disobedience that is hindering me along the way.  May I look back at a life of building places of worship.   Oh that it would be said of me, that I went "as the Lord had told him."

Who is God?   
He resists our efforts to build a name for ourselves.  
He confuses those who oppose Him.  
Because He desires His people and His glory to cover the earth, He disperses us.  

Prayer:
Father, you know my tendency to stay in one place, with one people and build my stairway to heaven.  But Oh God, you have not called me to one place or one people.  You have called me to proclaim your glory to the nations. May you be pleased when you "come down to see" my life.

Genesis 9:16 - Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth.” 

Prayer:
Oh Father, you have given everything to me.  Make my life fruitful oh God.  Allow the work of my hands to touch the ends of the earth.  I look up in wonder at your bow in the clouds, knowing that you are remembering.  You are covenant.  You are everlasting. You are good!

Genesis 8:1, 2, 20, 21:
“But God remembered Noah and all the beasts and all the livestock that were with him in the ark. And God made a wind blow over the earth, and the waters subsided. The fountains of the deep and the windows of the heavens were closed, the rain from the heavens was restrained...  Then Noah built an altar to the Lord and took some of every clean animal and some of every clean bird and offered burnt offerings on the altar. And when the Lord smelled the pleasing aroma, the Lord said in his heart, ‘I will never again curse the ground because of man, for the intention of man's heart is evil from his youth. Neither will I ever again strike down every living creature as I have done.’”

Prayer:
Father, I am carried by your redemption and mercy. 
Your breath Oh God restrains destruction. 
So I rest in your care. 
I hear the sounds of storms and loss all around me. 
I treasure this place of covering. 
But I treasure you most of all.
I bring you my offering of worship 
and ask that you make my life fruitful 
and a pleasing aroma to you.
Amen.

Genesis 6:5-14
The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And the Lord regretted that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart. So the Lord said, “I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land, man and animals and creeping things and birds of the heavens, for I am sorry that I have made them.” But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord. ...Now the earth was corrupt in God's sight, and the earth was filled with violence. And God saw the earth, and behold, it was corrupt, for all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth. And God said to Noah, “I have determined to make an end of all flesh, for the earth is filled with violence through them. Behold, I will destroy them with the earth. Make yourself an ark of gopher wood. Make rooms in the ark, and cover it inside and out with pitch.
 

Prayer:
Father, reading your word is heartbreaking because I see my heart in it. Forgive me for any way that I bring your grief and regret.  You have every right to blot out my life and to say, "I have determined. I will destroy."

Yet you offer redemption instead of judgment. 

So I run to you. Only in you do I find favor, covenant and salvation. Allow me to come in. Your son is righteous and blameless and has made a way for my salvation.

Amen.