that there would be a cake. That is because one year ago today, April 24th of 2016, is the first day, well, that's the date that we as a church formed, that we covenanted together as a church, when many of you were taken into membership at Cedar Point Baptist Church. Now, you know we'd been meeting in February and March, even before April, obviously, but that was the day that we really became a church, where we made a commitment together to follow Christ together and to help one another to do that. We're a year in now. As of tomorrow, we will have had our first birthday. And unless our Lord returns first, someday we will have our first wedding from this congregation. We've already had the first child born. And one day, to change the tone a bit, one day, if the Lord tarries, I will preach the first funeral for one of us. Unless, of course, Drew preaches mine first. But our work in this city is just beginning. We're a year in, and I know that many of us feel as though we are just getting started. Maybe we had bigger, grander expectations for the first year. As I've said so many times, the pattern that we see throughout Scripture is of slow, steady growth. That's the normal way that the Holy Spirit works. But what happens when we die? when you die and when I die, and the work in this city still isn't done, when there are still Muslims and Hindus and nominal Christians and people who know nothing at all of Jesus or any other God, when there are still people in this city who have not given to Jesus Christ the worship that he deserves. What happens when everyone in this room, again, assuming the Lord tarries, What happens when everyone in this room is gone? And what actions should we be taking now that will prepare the way for those who will follow after us? We have a tendency, I think in our culture, I assume that we have been, I'm certain that we have been shaped by our culture to expect that we can get what we think we ought to have and get it immediately. You know, we're Americans. We've got the plastic or the cash in our wallets to get us just about anything that we need or even want and to get it right away, or at least with, you know, two-day prime shipping from Amazon. Everything, right? I mean, I think back to when I was a kid, the high school football games on Friday night and you listen for the scores. And what happened if you listen on the radio and miss the scores at 8.05 p.m.? What'd you have to do? You wait another hour until the scores come through again. And if that's past bedtime or you miss it, you know, you're waiting for the newspaper the next morning and hopefully the scores came in before the deadline. And if not, you're waiting another whole day. You know, today, I could be standing, that's local high school football. Today, I could be standing right up here in front of you, put my phone down there, and without any of you ever knowing it, I could be checking soccer scores from England. Games that are happening right now. you'd be none the wiser. We expect, we've grown to believe that we should be able to get the information or the things that we want and have it now. I mean, go down to the local grocery store, H-E-B, Randall's, wherever. Go down and just check out the produce section afterwards. And you can find just about anything that you want there in the produce section. Stuff from all over the world. Seasonal vegetables. What are seasonal fruits and vegetables? You want strawberries in January? You got them. You want grapefruit in August? It's right there. Because we as Americans have mastered the ability to get what we want when we want it. But the Bible paints a far different picture for us. The Bible tells us that the most important things, the things that we ought to treasure most, are things that we cannot just reach out and grab. Things that we can't just click a couple times and find what we want. It should hardly surprise us that our cultural norms have shaped what we expect from God. And so friends, I want to ask us, you and me both, I want to ask us to humble ourselves this morning before his word, to let God's character and his purposes and our confidence in his timing reshape the way we think about him, reshape what we expect from him. and let us become people who trust in His promises for both the present and the future, who have rock-solid confidence in His promises, and who live in the reality that He will bring those promises to full fruition, if not now. and certainly in the future. Let's let that shape our lives now. We'll begin by reading the first portion of our text this morning, which is in Genesis, Chapter 22, the concluding part of Genesis, Chapter 22. We've been working our way through the book of Genesis over these last few months. And we've come to the last chapter in the life of Abraham. Abraham who was called out of the land far away, a land of idolatry, to a place that God promised, God promised he would give him. God promised he would give him it all and even marked out the boundaries that would be his. And not just to him, but to his offspring. His offspring who would become a great nation and bless all of the nations of the earth. But here we are in the text this morning and Abraham doesn't own a single square inch of that land yet. But the story starts with a word about his relatives, about his family back in Haran, back in the place where he'd come from. Let's begin by reading Genesis chapter 22, first book in your Bibles. And then the final verses of chapter 22. I'll pick up in verse 20. Now after these things it was told to Abraham, Behold, Milcah also has born children to your brother Nahor. Uz is firstborn, Buzz his brother, Chemuel the father of Aram, Chesed, Hazo, Pildash, Jidlaf, and Bethuel. Bethuel fathered Rebekah. These ate Milcah, Bort, and Nahor, Abraham's brother. Moreover, his concubine, whose name was Rumah, bore Teba, Gaham, Tahash, and Maaca. We've seen lots of genealogies already in Genesis. And many of the characters in the genealogies fade from the story. We don't see their names again, even as most of the names that we just read there in Genesis 22, they fade from the story. But this one's setting up some events that will follow. Remember, this is the family of Abraham, his brothers and his extended family that he had left behind in Haran when God called him to Canaan. Look in particular at verse 23. Verse 23 makes the point of noting that Bethuel fathered Rebekah, the only woman mentioned in this story. She's going to come up again in just another chapter. But after this brief prelude, we quickly learn about Sarah's death, about Abraham's loss of his wife. We see this in chapter 23, first couple verses here. Sarah lived 127 years. These were the years of the life of Sarah, and Sarah died at Kiriath Arba, that is Hebron, in the land of Canaan. And Abraham went in to mourn for Sarah and to weep for her. Notice something strange about this chapter. Just one verse really, verse two, just one verse about her death and Abraham's mourning. What's the rest of the chapter? We're gonna read it in just a moment. The rest of the chapter is Abraham's pursuit of a burial place for his wife. You know, we get 18 verses about Abraham trying to find a place to bury his wife and just one verse about his actual mourning after her death. Why would that be? I think with that, just consider that as I read verses three and four, which introduce us to Abraham's pursuit of this burial plot. And Abraham rose up from before his dead and said to the Hittites, I am a sojourner and foreigner among you. Give me property among you for a burying place that I may bury my dead out of my sight. Why so much more interest in this burial plot than in Sarah's death? Verse 5 all the way through the end of the chapter, through verse 20, talk about Abraham's, essentially his negotiations with these Hittites who are introduced in verses 3 and 4. Abraham is negotiating with them to try to come to terms that would give him the ownership of this land. Why is there so much attention? Well, one thing we need to realize is that Genesis is not a book of biographies. It's not as if you go to the library or order a book that summarizes one chapter each, the life of the first ladies of the United States, or one chapter each on each of the mayors of Austin or the governors of Texas. It's not a compilation of short biographies. The book of Genesis is much more than that. In some ways, it's less than that. In other ways, it's much more. Genesis is not a record of each person's life. No, Genesis is really much more a biography of God's works. Genesis is a record of what God does in the lives of the people that he has created. Genesis points to what God is doing first and foremost, not to what those people are doing for him. And so it's a selective story, it's a selective history of the people who walk on the face of this earth. And certain things are emphasized in order to make a point about what God is doing behind the scenes and in the scenes of people's existence. That's what we all need to be seeing as we study through Genesis. We need to see who God is. We need to look for how God is acting, how he is keeping his promises to his people, even in ways that they did not expect. We need to look for the promises that He makes and see how those promises are fulfilled. And along the way, we don't merely learn the history, the biography of the life of Abraham or Isaac or Adam or Noah. No, we learn about what God did in their lives. And we see that He is faithful and we learn to trust Him. So this question still remains, the question they keep asking. Okay, maybe you grant all that's true. Why do we need to know so much about this land? Well, we see in verse four that Abraham wants property. He wants to own a piece of this land. I'm a sojourner and a foreigner among you. Give me property among you for a burying place that I may bury my dead out of my sight. And then the Hittites answer, hear us, my Lord, you are a prince of God among us. Bury your dead in the choicest of our tombs. None of us will withhold from you his tomb to hinder you from burying your dead. So the Hittites have great respect for Abraham, they call him a prince of God, and they'll gladly just give him space in their own tombs to bury his dead. But Abraham doesn't want that. He wants there to be no question of the fact that he owns the land. Let me read you verses seven through 16. Abraham, his reply to the Hittites, he rose and bowed to the Hittites, the people of the land, and he said to them, if you are willing that I should bury my dead out of my sight, hear me and entreat for me Ephron, the son of Zohar, that he may give me the cave of Machpelah, which he owns. It is at the end of his field. For the full price, let him give it to me in your presence as a property for a burying place. Now Ephron was sitting among the Hittites, and Ephron the Hittite answered Abraham in the hearing of the Hittites, of all who went in at the gate of his city, no, my lord, hear me, I give you the field, and I give you the cave that is in it. In the sight of the sons of my people, I give it to you, bury your dead. Then Abraham bowed down before the people of the land, and he said to Ephron in the hearing of the people of the land, but if you will, hear me, I give the price of the field, accept it for me that I may bury my dead there. Ephron answered Abraham, my lord, listen to me, a piece of land worth 400 shekels of silver, what is that between you and me? Bury your dead. Abraham listened to Ephron, and Abraham weighed out for Ephron the silver that he had named in the hearing of the Hittites, 400 shekels of silver, according to the weights current among the merchants. So Abraham pays the full price. And it seems likely that this price, the asking price, 400 shekels, seems likely that this was above, perhaps well above the market value for the land. Abraham doesn't counter offer as might have been customary in this time in the ancient Near East. No, God has blessed him. And paying the asking price in front of these witnesses there at the gates, this leaves no doubt about the fact that the land would be his. He would own it. rather than perhaps some ambiguous gift of the field and the burial plot to Abraham, him buying it makes it clear that he owns it and that he owes no human anything. He owns it because of God giving him the ability to grow rich and to be able to pay the full asking price for this land. So the field of Ephron in Machpelah, which was to the east of Mamre, the field with the cave that was in it, and all the trees that were in the field throughout its whole area, was made over to Abraham as a possession in the presence of the Hittites before all who went in at the gate of his city. After this, Abraham buried Sarah, his wife, in the cave of the field of Machpelah, east of Mamre, that is Hebron, in the land of Canaan. The field and the cave that is in it were made over to Abraham as property for a burying place by the Hittites. So the first piece of land that Abraham owns, in all of Canaan, the first piece out of everything that God had promised him, he purchased to bury his wife. It's for a tomb that would later become his own tomb. And in fact we'll see soon that Abraham dies and this is the last, this is the only piece of land that he ever owns while he lives on the land that God had promised. Sarah dies and Abraham dies and really only a fraction of God's promise to Abraham is fulfilled by their death. They have a son. God had promised that. But everything about that nation becoming as great as the stars of the sky, the sand of the seashore, blessing all the nations of the earth, His name becoming great, there's only a hint of what would be. Only a fraction of God's promises are fulfilled. So, to answer the question, why is Abraham so attentive to his wife's burial place? Well, it's sort of like the altars we've seen him build, or the tree that we saw him plant. Abraham is so attentive to these things that point towards the future because he is declaring to his own family and he is declaring to the Hittites and the other people of the land around him, he is declaring that this land was his home. He is declaring his confidence that not just this burial plot and not just those altars and wells and the tree, not just those places, but all of that would belong to his offspring, to his descendants. He is declaring his confidence that God will keep his word, that God will make of him a great nation, though he dies with just a few people left behind him. It seems as though the Hittites grasp something of this. Did you notice that they're in verse six of chapter 23? They realize that this man who calls himself, Abraham calls himself in verse four a sojourner and a foreigner, but the Hittites recognize that Abraham is their Lord, that he is a prince of God among them. They see that God's hand is upon Abraham, just as others before who had come into some measure of conflict with Abraham, they recognize that God's hand was upon him. So also these Hittites recognize that he is part of God's royal family. And friends, this is who we are. Both of these things. We could go to the New Testament and see in places like First Peter that we are strangers, that we are pilgrims, similar language to what Abraham is, sojourners and foreigners. We, as God's people in this land, on this earth, We are strangers and foreigners, but at the same time, we are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a royal priesthood. So while we are people who are just sojourners in this land, we are essentially royalty displaced from our homeland because God has sent us here with a mission. God has sent us here with the same mission that He gave to Adam and Eve in the garden, to fill all of the earth with His worshipers, to fill all of the earth with people who bear His image, who reflect His character and glory and power and good use of authority over all the earth. We follow in Abraham's steps in this way very clearly. as sojourners and pilgrims, as young royals, princes of God, princes and princesses of God, sent for His purposes. So when we read in Hebrews chapter 11, when we read in Hebrews 11 about Abraham and this kind of summary statement about Abraham, we see ourselves in this as well. Speaking of Abraham, the author of Hebrews writes, these all died in faith. not having received the things promised. Not having received the things that God had promised to them, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. For people who speak thus, people who see the future and speak about the future as if it were fact, as if it were established reality, people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return. But as it is, they, speaking here of Abraham and Sarah and those who follow him, they desire a better country. That is a heavenly one. Therefore, God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city. And as we read in Romans 4 earlier in the service, that city, that inheritance that God has prepared for Abraham is an inheritance that we receive as well. So friends, the message of this portion of the text to us is for us to look forward with eyes like Abraham did, that Abraham looked forward expecting that this land would be his, it would belong to his offspring, and that there would even be a better heavenly country beyond that. He acted purchasing that land on the basis of how he knew God's promises regarding the future would come to pass. for you and us, for you and me, obedience to this. Faith in God's promises to us means that we live now not in order to acquire all the land, all the pleasures, all the things that we can right now, but to expect that the fullness of our inheritance is far off in such a way that we can barely see it with our eyes of faith. and that we may not possess it while we breathe air in this life. It will surely be ours for all eternity. This is why we sing songs like we open the service with, there is a happy land. There is a happy land far, far away, but it is a land that God has secured for his people. where the mourning and grief and sorrow that we pray about, that we encourage one another and try to sustain one another through that sorrow and grief, where it is all wiped away, where there is joy and rest and peace when God's promises are fulfilled. Some people say that we should think of our lives like a marathon, and there's something to that. There is a sense in which what it takes to finish a marathon, a long race, is to just keep putting one foot in front of another, one after another after another. But I want us to think of our lives in a bit of a different way. The marathon analogy applies to a limited degree. But I think we should think of our lives not as a marathon, as if we're straining towards the finish line just to finish the race, but as a relay race, recognizing that when we finish our part of the race, That race, that work is not done. We are passing off a baton to another generation that will come along behind us. And that that work of passing on the baton continue until Christ's return. You know, sometimes you'll even see in a marathon where a runner is approaching the finish line and there's nothing on the line at that point. The marathoner is just trying to finish. Not to finish in the top one or three or ten or whatever, but just to finish. And maybe there at the end of the race, they'll let up a bit. You never see a relay runner do that. You watch the Olympics. You watch the 4 by 400 relay. And each of those first runners that takes off, they are straining to the very end because they know that the one who follows after them needs every advantage that they can have for the whole team to be able to finish the race. And this is where we might tend to think of our lives as being too final, because it's not as if each one of us just needs to finish our race well. No, we need to prepare the way for those who will follow after us. The 20 year olds in this congregation, the children over in the room next to us today, who will one day carry on the mission that Jesus has entrusted to us long after we are all gone. Will you finish your race? enabling the one who follows after you to run it well. And I wonder, could we be satisfied if we died not seeing the fruit from our labors fully ripened while we draw breath? What if the fruit only ripened after we were gone? I think of what happened in China in the 20th century. In 1900 in the Boxer Rebellion when hundreds of missionaries were killed and it seems thousands of Chinese believers as well. More death later in the century during the Chinese Civil War that resulted in the communist takeover. Many imprisonments and deaths throughout the rest of the 20th century as the communist Chinese tried to stamp out every memory of Christianity from that nation. Scott, my friend visiting with us, spent some time overseas in China and asked him after the service, what's happening in China today? Reports today of tens of millions, if not hundreds of millions of believers, of people who've been transformed by the gospel in China, to the degree that some will report that there are more Christians in China than there are members of the Communist Party. That's what's happened in the century since people, by the hundreds, even the thousands, gave their lives for the name of Christ. that just this past week, the memory of 10 years ago this past week when three believers in the nation of Turkey were just brutally murdered for their faith in Christ. Men posing as those who were desiring to be a part of a Bible study came into their home. and then pulled out their knives and butchered three Christians, two Turkish believers and a German missionary. At that time, 2007, there were estimated to be 3,000 believers in the nation of Turkey, a nation of 80, 90 million people. Ten years later, twice that number of Christians. 6,000 out of 80, 90 million is still not a large number. But the number of people in that nation who trust Christ has doubled in just 10 years. Imagine if that continued to happen decade after decade. It's happened in other places. It's far exceeded that in other places. Those missionaries and believers in China died not seeing their hopes come to fruition. Those three believers in Turkey died in the process of going about their work. but God will bring their work, God will bring their, His promises to fulfillment even after they're gone. So friends, let me encourage you, let me encourage you to act now, to act now believing in God's promises so that those who follow after you will reap the harvest we've been sent into. Abraham showed his trust in God's promises in the way that he buried Sarah, and now we'll also see that same trust in the way that he sought a wife for his son Isaac. Let's look into chapter 24. Now Abraham was old, well advanced in years, and the Lord had blessed Abraham in all things. And Abraham said to his servant, the oldest of his household, who had charge of all that he had, You may remember from Genesis 9 that the Canaanites are under God's curse because of Ham's sin against his father. Instead he sends them, Abraham sends his servant, to his kindred, verse four, but go to my country, this is back to Haran where he had lived previously, and go to my kindred and take a wife, and take a wife for my son Isaac. His kindred are the people of the genealogy that we read there at the end of chapter 22. Let me read down through verse 14. The servant said to him, perhaps the woman may not be willing to follow me to this land. Must I then take your son back to the land from which you came? Abraham said to him, see to it that you do not take my son back there. The Lord, the God of heaven, who took me from my father's house and from the land of my kindred and who spoke to me and swore to me, to your offspring I will give this land, he will send his angel before you and you shall take a wife for my son from there. But if the woman is not willing to follow you, then you will be free from this oath of mine. Only you must not take my son back there. Those are Abraham's last words in scripture. So the servant put his hand under the thigh of Abraham, his master, and swore to him concerning this matter. Then the servant took ten of his master's camels and departed, taking all sorts of choice gifts from his master. And he arose and went to Mesopotamia, to the city of Nahor. And he made the camels kneel down outside the city by the well of water at the time of evening, the time when women go out to draw water. And he said, O Lord, God of my master Abraham, please grant me success today and show steadfast love to my master Abraham. Behold, I am standing by the spring of water, and the daughters of the men of the city are coming out to draw water. Let the young woman to whom I shall say, please let down your jar that I may drink, and who shall say, drink, and I will water your camels. Let her be the one whom you have appointed for your servant Isaac. By this I shall know that you have shown steadfast love to my master. Now in the Bible, we find all sorts of methods for discerning God's will, some better and some worse. Abraham's servant here doesn't give us a blueprint when he lays out this pattern for what he prayed God would fulfill. That when a girl showed up, he'd be willing to give not just him water, but of her own volition, water the rest of the camels. Abraham's servant took this to be a sign that this would be the woman who would be the bride for Isaac. I don't see this as a blueprint, but it is clear as the story unfolds that God does guide us. And the common thread throughout Scripture when God guides His people is their prayers. We saw this all throughout Acts. Every time the people of God have to make a major decision or every time they are sending people off to spread the gospel further and further in the book of Acts, they pray again and again and again. And here, the servant appeals to God's promises. He calls upon the Lord, upon the name of Yahweh, the promise-keeping God, the God who fulfills His word to His people. And he appeals to God's character. Did you see that there? I think it's in verse 12 of chapter 24. He says, oh Lord God of my master Abraham, please grant me success today and show steadfast love to my master Abraham. He appeals to God's character and to his commitment to his own word. Through his commitment to his own word, he would provide a wife for Isaac. I mean, there would have been no offspring for Isaac to fulfill the promise to Abraham if he doesn't find a bride. And so the servant appeals to God on the basis of his commitment to love his people, to keep his commitment to love his people, to fulfill this promise to give him a wife. When you're struggling to trust, when you and I struggle to trust God's promises because of circumstances, because of struggles in our own minds, the whispering doubts that come from Satan or from our own faithless hearts, When we are struggling to trust, friends, we see here a reminder that God's promises to you and to me are rooted in His own character. They are rooted in His steadfast love. Do you realize what that means? That means that if God doesn't keep His steadfast love, if He does not keep His word to us, then He ceases to be the God that He says He is. He says he is a God of love, a God who keeps his word, and if he does not, then he can no longer be who he is, and that's unthinkable. So friends, when we pray, when you pray, appeal God's own words, his own character back to him. Pray his own promises to his ears, and know that he will keep his word, even if the way he keeps his word doesn't look the way that you would like to see it play out. And what is prayer after all? Prayer is a declaration of independence from our own efforts. It's a declaration of the fact that we cannot depend upon our own strength. It's a declaration again and again and again of the fact that God is God and we are not God. It is a reminder to us. It's a reaffirmation of our dependence upon him. A reaffirmation of our trust in Him. So, brothers and sisters, reflect upon your habits of prayer. What do they look like? Infrequent? Brief? Non-existent? Devoted? Hungry? What sorts of adjectives would you apply to your prayer life? What does the presence or absence of our habits of prayer, what does that show that we're trusting in or depending on? Does the presence of prayer in your life say more that you're trusting in God or in yourself? Or just hoping on blind chance? We see the story continue in verse 15 of chapter 24. Before this servant, before he'd finished speaking, behold, Rebekah, who was born to Bethuel, the son of Milcah, the wife of Nahor, Abraham's brother, came out with her water jar on her shoulder. The young woman was very attractive in appearance, a maiden whom no man had known. She went down to the spring and filled her jar and came up. Then the servant ran to meet her and said, please give me a little water to drink from your jar. She said, drink, my lord. And she quickly let down her jar upon her hand and gave him a drink. When she had finished giving him a drink, she said, I will draw water for your camels also until they have finished drinking. So she quickly emptied her jar into the trough and ran again to the well to draw water. And she drew for all his camels. The man gazed at her in silence to learn whether the Lord had prospered his journey or not. When the camels had finished drinking, the man took a gold ring weighing half a shekel and two gold bracelets for her arms weighing 10 gold shekels and said, please tell me whose daughter you are. Is there room in your father's house for us to spend the night? She said to him, I am the daughter of Bethuel, the son of Milcah, whom she bore to Nahor. She added, we have plenty of both straw and fodder and room to spend the night. The man bowed his head and worshiped the Lord and said, blessed be the Lord, the God of my master Abraham, who has not forsaken his steadfast love and his faithfulness toward my master. As for me, the Lord has led me in the way to the house of my master's kinsmen. Then the young woman ran and told her mother's household about these things. The servant prayed God's character and his promises right back to him, and he is quick to worship. He is quick to offer praise to this God who had fulfilled his word in the very way that he had prayed. In verses 29 to 33, we see that the servant meets the family. I won't read this part of the text right now. Notice, though, if you happen to read it right now or later, Laban, we will see this guy next week. Laban is very interested when he hears of Abraham's riches and when he sees this gold jewelry on his daughter coming from Abraham's servant. That piques his curiosity. And then in verses 34 to 49, again, I won't read this part, the servant retells the story. Essentially, step for step of everything that had happened to him from leaving Abraham to when he met Rebekah there at the well. He retraces his steps in his encounter with Rebekah. and his speech is really an argument based on God's providence. He's saying, look, I prayed that this would happen, I prayed for God's guidance, and exactly as I prayed, it happened. Your daughter is to be the wife for my servants, for my master's son. And then in verse 49, I do wanna point your eyes to this part of the text, chapter 24, verse 49. Now then, if you are going to show steadfast love and faithfulness to my master, tell me, and if not, tell me that I may return to the right hand or to the left. Will the family of Rebecca allow her to follow after him? The answer becomes clear that God is acting sovereignly in this text. Rebecca jumps at the opportunity even when some of her family tries to delay. And let me just take a little sidebar here real quick. Since this text is often used to defend a courtship model for engagement, marriage, dating, that sort of thing, let me just make a couple quick comments, a few observations. This is one of the key texts that people use to say, hey, parents, family should be involved in making decisions for the bride, for the spouses of their children. But notice, even this text doesn't conform to the way that is commonly practiced. Most pro-courtship families don't send a family representative far away to find a cousin and bring that cousin back to marry the son or daughter. Now the text does give attention to some very important factors that often come up in the courtship model. It gives attention to Rebecca's selfless service. Her physical attractiveness and her chastity are noted there in verse 16. Her personal adornment is part of the whole package. In fact, shockingly enough, there's even a nose ring in verse 47. The woman's willingness to go along, the woman's willingness to be a part of this commitment is a part of the action, even sight unseen. So some of these observations fit the courtship model and some of them maybe don't fit it quite so well. What we should see here is God guiding this family in the way that this family needed to be guided. It's not in any way to say that it's a bad thing for the family to be highly involved, for you parents to be highly involved in the selection of a spouse. for your children. And it's not in any way, you children, in no way does this story leave you with the free reign to make the final choice, even as, or to be the lead, operating as the leader along the way, even though Rebecca does get to give her final consent there in this chapter. So as we consider what principles to apply regarding dating and courtship and marriage and all that sort of thing, let's make sure we use scripture well and let's do rely on godly counsel from people who know us well and are wise and care for us. But notice how the story ends. Let's pick up reading again in verse 50, chapter 24. Then Laban and Bethuel answered and said, The thing has come from the Lord. We cannot speak to you bad or good. Behold, Rebekah is before you. Take her and go and let her be the wife of your master's son, as the Lord has spoken. When Abraham's servant heard their words, he bowed himself to the earth before the Lord. The servant brought out jewelry of silver and of gold and garments and gave them to Rebekah. He also gave to her brother and to her mother costly ornaments. He and the men who were with him ate and drank, and they spent the night there. When they arose in the morning, he said, send me away to my master. Her brother and her mother said, let the young woman remain with us a while, at least 10 days. After that, she may go. But he said to them, do not delay me, since the Lord has prospered my way. Send me away that I may go to my master. They said, let us call the young woman and ask her. And they called Rebekah and said to her, will you go with this man? She said, I will go. So they sent away Rebekah, their sister, and her nurse, and Abraham's servant, and his men. And they blessed Rebekah and said to her, our sister, may you become thousands of ten thousands, and may your offspring possess the gait of those who hate them. Then Rebekah and her young women arose and rode on the camels and followed the man. Thus the servant took Rebekah and went his way. Now Isaac had returned from Beer-hal-la-hi-roi, and was dwelling in the Negev. And Isaac went out to meditate in the field toward evening. And he lifted up his eyes and saw, and behold, there were camels coming. And Rebekah lifted up her eyes, and when she saw Isaac, she dismounted the camel and said to the servant, who is that man walking in the field to meet us? The servant said, it is my master. So she took her veil and covered herself. And the servant told Isaac all the things that he had done. Then Isaac brought her into the tent of Sarah, his mother, and took Rebekah, and she became his wife. He loved her. So Isaac was comforted after his mother's death. Notice what a pivotal role Rebecca plays in this chapter. Back in verse five of chapter 24, Abraham's servant is uncertain that he'll be able to convince the woman to go with him. But here in verse 58, she has the decisive word. Her family leaves it to her and she says, I will go with him. As I reflected on the choice, this decision that Rachel faced, or that Rebecca faced, to leave her family, to travel hundreds of miles, to marry a man she'd never seen before, I couldn't help but think about how difficult it was for Meredith, I think, of following me to Texas. You've heard this story before. When we first came to visit, we were engaged, we were getting married in a couple months, and I had the opportunity to join the pastoral staff at High Point, the church that planted us here. And I brought Meredith in an airplane, hundreds, over 1,000 miles away from home, from a place that was green to a place that at that point was very brown, as brown as these chairs, as far as the eye could see. And it was a difficult trip for her. It was a difficult thing for her to imagine taking this trip far away from her family, far away from her friends who mattered a lot in her life, who had changed in so many ways the direction of her life. And here she was with this guy that she wasn't even married to yet, being expected to follow after him. I think about Rebecca, and I imagine What a difficult decision it must have been for her. I mean, at least, well, I was gonna say at least my wife had seen me before, but you might say, actually, Rebecca had an advantage there in not having seen Isaac. I opened myself up for that one, I guess. But Rachel's about to take, remember, she's about to take the very same journey that Abraham did. She's about to leave her homeland back in the Mesopotamian valleys to travel to Canaan. She didn't have a voice from God, just the voice from a servant, a servant of Abraham. And now she is entering into Abraham's faith, and Sarah's faith, and the faith of her husband-to-be, the faith of Isaac. She is now prepared to be a faithful wife or son of the promises. Just like we've seen Abraham grow in his faith, now the family of faith expands and carries on to another generation. Friends, we've heard now the last words from Abraham, those words in verses six through eight of this chapter. This man who set out boldly in faith and stumbled grandly on several occasions, he now finishes well. He finishes with a tested faith, the sort of tested faith we saw last week when he was ready to offer his son Isaac. Tested faith in the God who kept his promises to Abraham, who was advancing the fulfillment of what he said he would give him. God who was faithful and guided him all along the way. Now, at the end of his life, Abraham is fixed in his dependence upon God in the present and his hope, his confidence in God for the future. Today and every day, you and I are making decisions. What are the beliefs and the convictions that guide our decisions here in the present? And what are our expectations for the future that set our course? Expectations that define how we will hand off the baton to a generation that will come after us. We've seen through this story and so many others that God is the central character in this story, but not just the central character. Come back to that in a second. Who do you think of God as being in your story? Is he a supporting actor with you carrying the lead? Or is he merely the lead actor with you carrying an important supporting role? That's closer to the truth, but it's not the fullness of the story, because as we've seen from Genesis 1 on, God is not just the main actor in the story, he is the author of the story. He is the one who speaks and writes the promises and hands them to us. and tests us to see whether we will trust, to see how we will follow. As this story progresses from Abraham and now transfers to Isaac, we see that he is the omniscient and omnipotent author who is writing a good and beautiful story. It comes true exactly as he writes it. And the question for you and for me is, will we act in faith? Let's pray. Father, we keep seeing again and again, week after week, this theme throughout the book of Genesis that you keep your promises to your people. And yet week after week, we reflect upon our lives and upon the struggles we faced and the doubts we wrestled with and the choices we made. And we can think of ways we have regrettably chosen to act with faithlessness. We have chosen not to trust you. Lord, we come to you again appealing for your forgiveness. We come appealing for your forgiveness and confidence that you'll provide it as you always do. Father, we pray that you would grant us faith to trust you in the week to come. Continue to spread the gospel of the good news of Jesus Christ in hope that he will bring it to fulfillment. that your Holy Spirit will take that word and spread it and bring it to harvest. We pray all these things in Jesus' name. Amen.