Genesis 15:8-21 and Matthew 10:32-42 (NIV)

Genesis 15:8-21

8    But Abram said, “Sovereign LORD, how can I know that I will gain possession of it?”
9    So the LORD said to him, “Bring me a heifer, a goat and a ram, each three years old, along with a dove and a young pigeon.”
10  Abram brought all these to him, cut them in two and arranged the halves opposite each other; the birds, however, he did not cut in half.
11  Then birds of prey came down on the carcasses, but Abram drove them away.
12  As the sun was setting, Abram fell into a deep sleep, and a thick and dreadful darkness came over him.
13  Then the LORD said to him, “Know for certain that for four hundred years your descendants will be strangers in a country not their own and that they will be enslaved and mistreated there.
14  But I will punish the nation they serve as slaves, and afterward they will come out with great possessions.
15  You, however, will go to your ancestors in peace and be buried at a good old age.
16  In the fourth generation your descendants will come back here, for the sin of the Amorites has not yet reached its full measure.”
17  When the sun had set and darkness had fallen, a smoking firepot with a blazing torch appeared and passed between the pieces.
18  On that day the LORD made a covenant with Abram and said, “To your descendants I give this land, from the Wadi of Egypt to the great river, the Euphrates—
19  the land of the Kenites, Kenizzites, Kadmonites,
20  Hittites, Perizzites, Rephaites,
21  Amorites, Canaanites, Girgashites and Jebusites.”

Matthew 10:32-42

32  “Whoever acknowledges me before others, I will also acknowledge before my Father in heaven. 
33  But whoever disowns me before others, I will disown before my Father in heaven.
34  “Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. 
35  For I have come to turn, “‘a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law—
36  a man’s enemies will be the members of his own household.’
37  “Anyone who loves their father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves their son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. 
38  Whoever does not take up their cross and follow me is not worthy of me. 
39  Whoever finds their life will lose it, and whoever loses their life for my sake will find it.
40  “Anyone who welcomes you welcomes me, and anyone who welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me. 
41  Whoever welcomes a prophet as a prophet will receive a prophet’s reward, and whoever welcomes a righteous person as a righteous person will receive a righteous person’s reward. 
42  And if anyone gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones who is my disciple, truly I tell you, that person will certainly not lose their reward.”