Gen15:1 After these things the word of the LORD came to Abram in a vision, "Do not be afraid, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great."
Gen15:2 But Abram said, "O Lord GOD, what will you give me, for I continue childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?"
Gen15:3 And Abram said, "You have given me no offspring, and so a slave born in my house is to be my heir."
Gen15:4 But the word of the LORD came to him, "This man shall not be your heir; no one but your very own issue shall be your heir."
Gen15:5 He brought him outside and said, "Look toward heaven and count the stars, if you are able to count them." Then he said to him, "So shall your descendants be."
Gen15:6 And he believed the LORD; and the LORD reckoned it to him as righteousness.
Gen15:7 Then he said to him, "I am the LORD who brought you from Ur of the Chaldeans, to give you this land to possess."
Gen15:8 But he said, "O Lord GOD, how am I to know that I shall possess it?"
Gen15:9 He said to him, "Bring me a heifer three years old, a female goat three years old, a ram three years old, a turtledove, and a young pigeon."
Gen15:10 He brought him all these and cut them in two, laying each half over against the other; but he did not cut the birds in two.
Gen15:11 And when birds of prey came down on the carcasses, Abram drove them away.
Gen15:12 As the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram, and a deep and terrifying darkness descended upon him.
Gen15:13 Then the LORD said to Abram, "Know this for certain, that your offspring shall be aliens in a land that is not theirs, and shall be slaves there, and they shall be oppressed for four hundred years;
Gen15:14 but I will bring judgment on the nation that they serve, and afterward they shall come out with great possessions.
Gen15:15 As for yourself, you shall go to your ancestors in peace; you shall be buried in a good old age.
Gen15:16 And they shall come back here in the fourth generation; for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete."
Gen15:17 When the sun had gone down and it was dark, a smoking fire pot and a flaming torch passed between these pieces.
Gen15:18 On that day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, "To your descendants I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates,
Gen15:19 the land of the Kenites, the Kenizzites, the Kadmonites,
Gen15:20 the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Rephaim,
Gen15:21 the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites, and the Jebusites."