"Abraham in Canaan was like a stranger in a strange land. His dress, his appearance, his mannerisms, his accent permitted everyone to recognize that he was an alien in the land. The implication of the preacher's statement is that Abraham's life-style, his values, and his goals were determined not by his surroundings but by the vision of God and an unwavering conviction that God had called him through a word of promise.
The promised land to which he emigrated was like a foreign country, in which he lived a nomadic existence. The detail that he, together with his son Isaac and his grandson Jacob, lived in tents implies that he had not come to settle down, to establish rots in a culture devoid of God. He was on pilgrimage as an expression of committed faith."