Hello and welcome to the third in this series of broadcasts on Genesis chapter 24. We entitled it, Here Comes the Bride. Have your Bible ready if you can. Well, we're finding in chapter 24 here a tremendous story about Abraham sends his servant to get a bride for Isaac. And we have said before, we have several types here in this story. Abraham is a type of God the Father. Isaac, of course, is a type of the son. Rebecca is a type of the bride. She's, of course, representing the Christian. And then you have the servant, who's a type of the Holy Spirit. Very interesting chapter here. as the servant comes and he prays and he's looking for a couple of things to be a sign that God is in this and we can get the right bride for Isaac. Now first of all he prays and he says that she would let him have some of her water and second he prayed as we saw in our last broadcast that she would offer to water the ten camels. Now Think about that for a minute. She comes out and she gives this stranger some water. That in itself is quite a thing. She let him drink out of her pitcher. Then she offers to water those ten camels. I'll draw water for those camels. Now think about that for a minute. If there's ten camels, there's a large group of people traveling here. It's not just a couple of people. There's a crowd. And there's no reason why all the able-bodied men in that crowd couldn't get down there, and if there was 50 men, they all got a pitcher of water, it would be all done. There's no reason for her to say, I'll water the camels. But she does, in direct answer to the prayer that he had prayed, saying, let her give me a drink and let her water the camels. So not only do we have 10 camels here, but we have two questions that are very interesting. And the first question is, whose daughter art thou? Because she has to be of the lineage of Abraham. And she answers the question in verse 24. And yes, very good. Now we got the first question answered. She is part of the kindred. Now, let's check on the kindness. The second question is, could you take care of us here? See all those camels? They're going to have to eat. See all those people that came with them? You think we could come over for supper? That's quite an ass-asking a lot. Well, what does she do? Immediately, she says unto him in verse 25, we have both straw, and poventer enough, and room to lodge in and so yeah she says come on over we're going to take care of everybody and we're going to put on supper for you fellas tonight now we'll pick this up at verse number 28 in genesis 24 where it says here that the damsel ran and told of her them of her mother's house these things and rebecca had a brother and his name was laven and laven ran out unto the man under the well. Why did he do that? Well, because verse 30 tells us he saw the earrings and the bracelets. And you'll see later on in this story, Laban had a focus on things that had to do with materialistic stuff. Anyway, he comes out, and the Lord's going to use him one way or another. uh he he he heard the words of rebecca his sister saying thus spake the man unto me that he came unto the man and behold he stood by the camels at the well and he said come in thou blessed of the lord wherefore standest thou without for i have prepared the house and the room for thy camels we've got supper ready We've got room for your camels, everything's great." And the man came into the house, and he ungirded his camels, and gave straw and pavander for the camels, and water to wash the feet of the men's feet that were with him. And there was set meat before him to eat, and he said, I will not eat until I have told my Aaron. And he said, Speak on. Well, he goes down through this next portion of the scripture, and he goes through all the very minute details of how things have happened up to this point. It's very, very interesting as you go through that. We won't take the time to read all of that again, because it's exactly what we read in the other broadcast, in a recent broadcast. But we see here that he explains to him in detail exactly what is happening. Well, after going through all of the details, he says here in verse number 49, And now, if ye will deal kindly and truly with my master, tell me, and if not, tell me, that I may turn to the right hand or to the left. I really like this verse. Let's get it straight. Tell me, he said, Tell me yes, tell me no, let's not have any nonsense. We're going one way, we're going the other. He said that I may turn to the right hand or to the left. Now this is the first time that you'll find this phrase, turn to the right hand or to the left, in the Bible here in Genesis 24 verse 49. That phrase actually occurs 20 times in the Bible. As you study them through, you will find there's two areas of responsibility that it deals with. One has to do with doctrine, that is our position that we take concerning the things of the Word of God. And the other responsibility has to do with doing things as we learn the doctrine. It's one thing, you know, we call it the philosophy of ministry, how we do what we know we're supposed to do. And so we have the doctrine, we have the doing, we have the position that we take, and we have the path that we take. Now concerning the doctrine or concerning our position on the doctrine, it says in Proverbs 4 in verse 27, turn not to the right hand nor to the left, remove thy foot from evil. Don't turn right, don't turn left when it comes to getting away from sound doctrine. Joshua put it this way in Joshua 1 and 7, You're going to take the law. You're going to take the doctrine. Do not turn right. Do not turn left. Go straight ahead. He said again at the end of his life in Joshua 23 and verse number six, do all that is written in the book of the law. Turn not aside from there from to the right hand or to the left concerning the doctrine. Don't turn. That's the spiritual aspect of life. Now concerning the path, concerning the doing of the doctrine, concerning how we do things in our lives, he says here in this verse, tell me, tell me, are you with me or are you not with me? I have a job to do and if you're not involved in it, I'll find out who is. Tell me, he says, that I may turn to the right hand or to the left. We have in Isaiah chapter 30, And verse number 21, it says, and thine ears shall hear a word behind thee saying, this is the way, walk ye in it when ye turn to the right hand and when ye turn to the left. And so there's some things you may have to say, well, this isn't working. I'm going to turn and go this direction. I'm going to do it this way. I'm going to do it that way. Don't be locked in. Well, we've always done it this way. Don't put God down to any one specific way of doing things. However, when it comes to doctrine, oh yes, yes, turn not to the right hand, nor turn to the left. Remove thy foot from evil. Stay on the path of sound doctrine. Well, in answer to his question, we read in verse number 50 that, then Laban and Bethel answered and said, The thing proceedeth from the Lord. We cannot speak unto thee bad or good. Behold, Rebekah is before thee. Take her and go and let her be thy master's son's wife as the Lord has spoken. And it came to pass when Abraham's servant heard these words, he worshiped. That's the third time in this book of Genesis we find somebody worshiping actually with that word. Now we've seen lots of altars way back at the beginning with Cain and Abel and so on. But here we have the reference to the fact that he worshipped the Lord, bowing himself to the earth. And the servant brought forth jewels of silver and jewels of gold and raiment and gave them to Rebekah, and he gave also to her brother, yeah, he liked that, and to her mother precious things. Then, after they had settled all of this about what are we doing with Rebekah, And then we read in verse 54, and they did eat and drink. And he and all the men, all the men that were with him, I said, there's a crowd and tarried all night. And they rose up in the morning and said, send me away unto my master. And the brother, her brother and her mother said, let the damsel abide with us a few days, at least 10. and after that she shall go. And he said unto them, Hinder me not, seeing the Lord hath prospered my way, and send me that I may go to my master. I got a job to do, and I'm anxious to get it done. Send me away. Well, he's very anxious to get on the way, but there's always going to be somebody who will hinder you from doing the Lord's will. The Bible says in Galatians 5 and 7, he did run well. Who did hinder you? that you should not obey the truth. So he says here in verse number 56, hinder me not, don't hinder me, I gotta get on, gotta get going. And they said, well, call the damsel and inquire at her mouth. And they called Rebecca and said unto her, wilt thou go with this man? And she said, I will go. What a beautiful verse. She said, I will go. Wilt thou go? I will go." Let me tell you what you don't have in this verse, all right? You don't have any Calvinism. You don't have any answer that says, well, I don't have any choice. You realize she is representing the bride of Christ. She is representing the Christian. She is representing the one who has to make a decision. She's not got some kind of button in her head that God pushes a thing and you have to get saved, and another button over here you can't get saved. That is a ridiculous heresy that is called Calvinism, and there's none of that here. They said, Will you go? She said, Yes, I will go. She made a decision. Well, verse 59 says, They sent away Rebekah, their sister, and her nurse, and Abraham's servant, and his men. And they blessed Rebekah and said unto her, Thou art our sister, be thou the mother of thousands of millions, and let thy seed possess the gate of those which hate them. And of course, this has to do with the nation of Israel and what God said would become of Abraham's descendants. Well, we read in 61, and Rebekah arose and her damsels, and they rode upon the camel and followed the man, and the servant took Rebekah and went his way. Interesting journey. We got a rough trip here. They have 500 miles ahead of them. It says the servant took Rebecca. It's a picture of the Holy Spirit being in charge of the Christian here. That's just basically what we have. Well, when we get to verse number 62, it says, Isaac came and when Isaac went out to meditate, it says in verse 63, in the field at Eventide, he lifted up his eyes and saw, and behold, the camels were coming. Boy, that must have been a great day for him when he saw that load of camels coming over the hill. And Rebekah lifted up her eyes, and when she saw Isaac, she lighted off the camel. For she had said unto the servant, What man is this that walketh in the field to meet us? And the servant had said, It is my master. Therefore she took a veil and covered herself. And the servant told Isaac all things that he had done. and Isaac brought her into his mother Sarah's tent and took Rebekah, and she became his wife, and he loved her, and Isaac was comforted after his mother's death. Well, we read here again in verse number 64, and Rebekah lifted up her eyes when she saw Isaac. She lighted off the camel. What a beautiful verse. You know, when someone's going to come to Christ, when the Holy Spirit's in charge like He is in this story, you don't have to go through some kind of a sales pitch and get them to get in all the right Oh, you know, here, preach a seven-point sermon at Rebecca here and see if we can get her into a mood of some kind of emotional response and get her to come to Isaac. No, that's not the way it happens. I said in our last broadcast, I get so weary, you know, we say, well, if you want to receive Jesus Christ now, Let's just bow your head and close your eyes. We don't want to embarrass you. No, no. I think what we need to do is just simply say you want to get to receive Christ, jump off your camel. Let's get going here. Who do you think we're dealing with anyway? I think we've messed up here in this area. We really have. Well, we're out of time again. You can hear that music in the background. That's a definite clue for me. I got to get out of here. We'll try to get it plain and simple in our next broadcast. Hope you can tune in.