Acts 7:6

The Passion Translation

God spoke with him and gave him this promise: ‘Your descendants will live in a foreign land with a people who will make slaves of them and oppress them for four hundred years.

Cross References

Genesis 15:13

Then Yahweh said to Abram, “Know this: your descendants will live as strangers in a foreign country. They will be enslaved and mistreated for four hundred years.

Genesis 15:16

And after the fourth generation, your descendants will return here; for then the sin of the Amorites will be ripe for judgment.”

Galatians 3:17

This means that the covenant between God and Abraham was fulfilled in Messiah and cannot be altered. Yet the written law was not even given to Moses until 430 years after God had “signed” his contract with Abraham! The law, then, doesn’t supersede the promise since the royal proclamation was given before the law. If that were the case, it would have nullified what God said to Abraham. We receive all the promises because of the Promised One—not because we keep the law!