We're in Genesis 24 this morning, Genesis 24, and we are wrapping up kind of this first half of Genesis. And for the rest of the summer, we're actually going to transition out of Genesis for a little bit, and then once we hit the fall, we'll kind of transition back in. But this is kind of a good stopping point as we wrap up in the next week or so, this section of Genesis. And we are about halfway through. I know. Like quite literally, it'll have been a year come July, the beginning of July. And so it's been a thorough study. I trust you agree. But we're going to look at kind of this final section here of Genesis 24 and 25. And then we're going to kind of pivot to some different things for the rest of the summer. And then we'll pivot back to Genesis and finish off. Lord willing, faster than the next year. We've been digging deep because again, as you look at the life of Abraham, as you look at the beginning of Genesis, there's so much that's being built. Once you hit this point though, you start getting into a study of the most dysfunctional of dysfunctional families. There is so much going on that is just an absolute mess from here on out. Like Abraham and Isaac, they're the stable ones and then Then we get into a guy with four wives and about 14 children from the four wives and they're all fighting over each other and they killed random cities just because and then send someone into exile. I mean, it is... Let's just say if you were making up a history like your family history You wouldn't make this up as your family history to be like, yeah we're like completely unbelieving and we just randomly deceive people because we want to deceive them and like we just Randomly wipe out entire towns after deceived like you would not make that up. So So again, what what is really neat though is is it's showing God's grace and it's showing God's faithfulness And that's where we're kind of wrapping up this first phase of Genesis because again, there's a covenant that's been made a promise that's been made and so here in this key point, this is such an important section of Genesis because what happens is Abraham has been given a promise that through Isaac your name will be called. So your lineage is going to come down through Isaac. Isaac does not have a wife and he's a chipper young 37 years old and Abraham's going, we need to find you a wife, which is, I mean, I, it's interesting because when you start looking at how old some of these people really are in different passages, you're like, this guy's getting married at like 37 and then that guy's getting married at like 15. You're like, what is, you know, and it just kind of like, as you stop and look at, at some of these, these chronologies and you're like, you know, I just always thought they were like 20, you know, just like all of these guys, they're just like a default of 20 or something, but no, it's like, Wow, there's a lot of stuff going on and I don't understand. And so I just want you to see this because here is Isaac and Abraham's servant has gone into this foreign land. And I boiled it down the last two weeks, I really came back to this idea of covenant. God is gonna be faithful to carry on the promises that he's made. And remember, he made a few promises. He made a promise of the land, all right, and he started fulfilling that one at this point. Abraham actually has a parcel of ground that he's bought. He's living on the land. And so that one is kind of you could say pending. All right, and so it's it's happening. But then he also promises the seed and that seed is going to be through Isaac. And so Not yet. And so Abraham is going to basically have to trust the Lord that this one is going to take care of itself. And so that's what he's doing. He's sending out his servant, go find a wife for my son, and that way this one can get taken care of. And so here we are in Genesis 24. And let's just get started here. We're about in the middle of the passage, verse 32. And this is where the man comes in. This is the servant. Again, we don't know exactly who this servant is. We don't get him named, but earlier the servant of Abraham was Eleazar. He was going to be Abraham's heir until God clarified things. We don't know if this is still Eleazar. Again, God didn't see fit to tell us, so it really doesn't matter. But some people think it is, so there you go. But in 32 it says, And the man came into the house, and he ungirded the camel, and he gave straw and provender for the camels, and water to wash his feet. And the men and 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've told mine errand, and they said, speak on. And so he looked at all this last week, and it's just this idea of him saying, this is why I've come, this is what's gonna happen, and I'm gonna praise the Lord for every little bit of this. And so we see that story play out, he tells the whole story again, as we looked last week, and so he kind of just reviews everything going on. Verse 46, he shows a very specific answer to prayer. And again, he tells him, he said, I was praying that the Lord would send me a young lady and that she would not only give me to drink, but also the camels and not just one of the camels, all the camels. And so it's a very, very specific prayer that you could not accidentally fulfill unless you were just in the habit of randomly watering everybody's animals all the time. And so, but I wanna draw attention to this because I think there's times where we, Personally, we start to doubt the Lord's provision. Like we read story after story after story of God providing and we can go through countless stories of God providing, but there's times where we forget because either we don't write it down or memory's bad or whatever. He's rehearsing one more time. This is how faithful God is. This is how specifically God answered this prayer. And I know I've struggled with God. Is God really gonna answer this prayer? Is God really gonna do this thing? And I think back over the times where God has answered in a very specific way, and I've told you some of those stories, but there's still that doubt that creeps in and there's still that frustration of like, I don't know that God's gonna come through again. Well, where's the faith? And again, what I find beautiful here is you've heard the old saying, never pass up the opportunity to give someone a compliment. If you have the opportunity to, it's nice. He's never passing up an opportunity to speak well of God. He's going, the Lord did this kindness. The Lord graciously provided. Praise the Lord. I love that, that he's doing that. He's coming back and he's saying, can I tell you how awesome God is? Can I tell you one more time? And he's just coming back over and over. And so he's rehearsing what God's done. He's reviewing the very specific prayer request he made that God answered. And he's just heaping praise upon praise upon the Lord. And that's what you see here in verse 29. That's what he's in the middle of doing. Verse 47, sorry, 46. Verse 47, he says, and I asked you whose daughter art thou? And she said, the daughter of Bethuel, Nahor's son, that Milcah bear him. And he put an earring upon her face and bracelets upon her hands. And he said, and I bowed my head and I worshiped the Lord and I blessed the Lord God of my master Abraham that has led me in the right way to make my master's brother's daughter under his son. And so again, he's just very specifically coming and saying God answered a very specific prayer. I'm just gonna keep praising the Lord for this amazing request that he answered. He did, he's satisfied. And so again, Abraham sends out him in faith. The servant says, I just really wanna know, like, Lord, will you clarify some things for me? And we could almost say it's him putting out the fleece, like Gideon's fleece, where he says, I'm gonna put this thing out and just, this is gonna be a really crazy way to test the Lord on this. I don't recommend doing that all the time. And if you're going to do a fleece, make sure it's very clear that it's a fleece. You can't just be like, I'm just going to pray that it snows. It's like, well, you live in the north. It's always snowing. Yeah, but that's going to be the way that I know for sure. It's like, no. Like with Gideon's fleece, it was something that just was completely miraculous that you could not explain any other way. It wasn't just like, I'm going to pray that the leaves blow that way today. That's not. Not putting down a fleece. That's just situation things. And so he very clearly made a prayer request saying, this lady, she's going to have to be related to my siblings. She's going to have to have this qualification. She's going to have to do all of this. And again, that just doesn't happen by accident. And when the prayer was answered, he took the time to praise the Lord for it. And he says this, verse 48, And so he just makes those decisions. So we looked at a lot of that last week. But then look at verse 55. And it says, and her brother and her mother said, let the damsel abide with us a few days, at the least 10, and then she shall go. Again, this is just a funny little side note that they're like, let's just linger for a few weeks. It's just funny. You'll see this throughout. So like I said, I've been reading through Judges. And I've finally gotten through Judges in my devotions. And that's a good time when you finally move out of Judges. I got depressing. But toward the end of Judges, you see this guy traveling and he runs into his father-in-law. And the guy just will not let him go. It's basically the trick he was playing to get the guy to stay around a little longer and a little longer and a little longer. And he was like, just stay one more day. One more day and I'll throw you a feast. And one more day and I'll throw you a feast. And it's getting really late. Why don't you leave tomorrow? And then it's like, why don't you stay one more day and I'll throw you a feast? And this story just keeps happening over and over. And you read it. And basically, this guy lingers forever because it's that family member who doesn't want the family member to leave the house, just keeps pulling out excuse after excuse after excuse. It's the opposite of here's your hat, what's your hurry? It's the, why don't you just stay one more night? It's like 10 in the morning. You don't want to start your trip now, do you? And it's a game they're playing to say, we're not going to let you take our daughter. That's the game they're playing. And the servant knows this. They're saying, why don't you just let her stay for 10 days? And then you can go. And he goes, yeah, we're not playing that game. I'm taking her back to Abram. I'm taking her back to my master. Verse 56, he says, and he said unto them, hinder me not, seeing the Lord has prospered my way. Send me away that I may go to my master. And so he's just not going to play the game. He's like, no, no, I'm not lingering here for another month because you keep coming up with an excuse for me to stay. let's take care of this and let's go. Verse 57, and he said, we will call the damsel and inquire at her mouth. And they called Rebecca and they said, will you go with the man? And she said, I will go. And so, again, there's just little applications here. I think it's a powerful little testimony that God completely provides, God completely clears the way, and the servant takes the action to say, okay, let's go forward and let's take care of this. He's not a lingerer, he doesn't hesitate. And again, you see that contrast throughout even the stories we looked at so far. You see Lot, he lingers. He knows what's right to do. He knows what he's got to take care of. He knows the job he's got to perform. And what does he do? He lingers to the point that they have to grab him by the hand and drag him out of the city. What does Abraham do? He knows exactly what the task needs doing. He knows exactly where and when he needs to go. And what does he do? He gets up early and goes and takes care of it. And so I find that an encouragement because, again, take care of things when you know you have to take care of them. Don't keep putting it off, don't keep putting it off, don't keep putting it off. And that's what we see in this case. And this servant goes, no, I'm not lingering another 10 days. Like, we've got to go. And he does. Verse 60, and they blessed Rebekah, and they said unto her, thou art our sister, be thou a mother of thousands of millions. Let thy seed possess the gate of them that hate them. And that prophecy is come to fulfillment many times over the years. But again, he's saying, hey, you're gonna be, this promise, this promise is gonna be fulfilled through you. And so Isaac and Rebekah are gonna be that beautiful picture. And Rebekah arose and her damsels, and they rode upon camels, and they followed the man, and the servant took Rebekah and went his way. And this is, again, now it flashes back over to Isaac. Okay, so this is like a narrative. This is like a story that's being told. And so you see everything from the servant's point of view, but you don't know what Isaac's going through. I mean, you've got to imagine that's a little nerve-wracking. He's sitting there waiting, going, will God deliver? Is this actually going to happen? What's going on? Abraham, he's seen God do enough stuff that I think Abraham probably has a bit more confidence, because Abraham's going, yeah, this is going to happen. But even Abraham, I mean, we've We can speak to this. There's a lot of stuff that we go through that we still doubt the next time. We still go, is God gonna do this again like he's done it 46 times in the past? Is he gonna do it 47? I don't know why we doubt like that. I mean, we're humans, so I guess that's it. But Abraham, he's sitting there going, okay, yep. And again, but a lot's riding on this. But we don't know what conversations are going on at Abraham and Isaac. What is their feelings like? Basically, we see all the victory, and we see all the things God's been moving out of the way. And then you just see this convoy coming back up over the hill, and you're like, did he get her? Is it successful? Like, who is it? You know, would she be pretty? You know, whatever. And again, here's what happens. Isaac came from the way of Lehiroi, where he dwelt in the south country, so we see some of the familiar place names that we've seen so far. And Isaac went out to meditate in the field at Eventide, and he lifted up his eyes, and he saw, and behold, the camels were coming. And Rebekah lifted up her eyes, and when she saw Isaac, she lighted off the camel. For she had said unto his servant, what man is that 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 that he had done. And Isaac brought her into his mother Sarah's tent. And he took her back. And she became his wife. And he loved her. And Isaac was comforted after his mother's death. And the story ends. You know, and there you go. And so the promise has been fulfilled. The covenant is, I mean, it's not secure in the state of, like, sand is the seashore yet. You know, they have a few kids, you know, so they're getting there. But again, now it's less endangered. But again, every victory is just the next stage that now we need to go on to the next step. And so again, God just very vigorously provides in this way. Now if we hop to chapter 25, I want you to see this. Because again, Abraham, he's 130 or so at this point. So he's well on in years. but he's lonely and so he takes another wife. And so this story, again, Abraham, it doesn't matter really what Abraham does now. Like Isaac is the promise. Isaac is the one that everything's gonna come through. So Abraham is gonna have other kids. Isaac is the promised one. Ishmael has been removed from the scene. He's still alive, but he's not a promised son. But what this is doing is it's kind of showing that God blesses Abraham in other ways, too. And so look at chapter 25, and it says, and Abraham took him a wife, and her name was Keturah, and she bare him Zimram, and Joksham, and Midan, and Midian, and Ishbak, and Shua. which are really cool names. But again, it's showing that the Israelites, like when they come back, they're gonna have a lot of other family lines, all right? And so like the Moabites and the Ammonites, like there's all these people that are distantly related to them that are all living in this land. And now it's saying Abraham has other wives. in addition to Hagar and Sarah, he's got this wife by the name of Keturah, and here are all these children. And it says, and the sons of Midian are Ephah, and Epher, and Hanak, and Abida, and Eldah, and these are the children of Keturah. And Abraham gave all that he had unto Isaac. And so Abraham's keeping to that promise. He said, Isaac is the one who the promise goes to. Isaac is gonna be kind of the patriarch of the family. So all those resources are gonna go to Isaac, and it's gonna be Isaac's job to distribute how he sees fit. So that's basically what you've got going on here, is Abraham is giving this extra portion, in this case, all the portions, to Isaac, but he's gonna give gifts to his other kids. And Abraham gave all that he had on Isaac, but under the sons of the concubines, which Abraham had, Abraham gave gifts and sent them away from Isaac, his son, while he yet lived, eastered into an eastern country. These are the days and the years of Abraham's life in which he lived, 103 score and 15 years. So 175, that's a good record. All right, now I want you to note this because this is a good long life. But later on, when we get to Abraham's kids, some of them will live a similar length, and they will talk about how few and evil the days of their life were. And the reason they do that is because, again, they take matters into their own hands, they're deceptive, they're tricky, and they basically bring ruin on their life. And so even though they live a long life, it was a miserable life, and so they will say, few and evil are the days of my pilgrimage, and I have not attained to the years of my father's. Again, in some cases they actually did, but it was more a quality description rather than a quantity description. And so Abraham's gonna live 175 years old, again, just a very full life. And Abraham gave up the ghost and he died in a good old age, an old man, but then it clarifies, and this is what I was just explaining, and full of years. So it's a quality of life, not just quantity. He lives a long time, but he also lives a good time, all right? And again, his life wasn't easy. He walked by faith, he lived by faith. But one of the things that we can look back on Abraham's life, and we kind of look across the board, we can say, this is a man who was faithful to God in the thick and the thin, good and the bad times. Like very rarely, and we've got a few instances where he does, very rarely did Abraham take matters into his own hands. Abraham trusted God. Abraham did the right thing. And again, the fact that we can bring up just like a few instances where Abraham took matters into his own hands and we can say, yeah, he shouldn't have done that. But the vast majority of what we see about Abraham is a man who was faithful and a man who just very humbly walked with the Lord. And that's why the Bible can say here at the end, he lived a full life. He was gathered to his people full of years. And again, it's quantity and quality. But again, I want you to hop forward in your mind to Jacob and Esau. Yeah, Jacob is literally gonna say, he's sitting there before Pharaoh, and Pharaoh goes, well, you're an old man. And he goes, yeah, but few and evil have been the days of my pilgrimage, and I've not attained unto the years of my fathers. And you look at that and you go, why? What's the difference here? Why is Jacob at the end of his life miserable and complaining about the years that he's lived? Whereas Abraham could be described as, here's a man full of life at the moment he dies. And I really think it comes down to, if you look at how Jacob lived his life, he was conniving and heel grabbing and just live in that life his whole life. And you look at that and you go, that made for a very, very miserable existence. Whereas look at Abraham. Abraham had that surrender that was tough. Like it's hard either way. But I think Jacob made his life that much harder because he constantly had to heel grab everything. And so that's why, at the end here, we can say Abraham's life was old, he was full of years, and what is it? He was gathered to his people. And the sons Isaac and Ishmael, they buried him in the cave of Machpelah, in the field of Ephron, the son of Zohar the Hittite, which is before Mamre, the field which Abraham purchased of the sons of Heth. And there Abraham was buried, and his wife, and it came to pass after the death of Abraham that God blessed his son Isaac, and Isaac dwelt by the well Liharoi. And these are the generations of Ishmael. And then it just goes through the generations of Ishmael, goes through the generations of other people. And then verse 19, and these are the generations of Isaac, Isaac's son, Abraham begot Isaac. And Isaac was 40 years old when he took Rebekah to wife, the daughter of Bethuel, the Syrian of Ped and Aram, the sister of Laban the Syrian. And Isaac entreated the Lord for his wife because she was barren. And then you're like, oh. Oh, it's happening again. And so this is where we'll pause this series for a little bit, and we'll go to something else for the summer, and then we'll pop back. I'll leave you in suspense. What's going to happen? We don't know. Did the nation of Israel ever come into existence? OK, we know what happens. But again, imagine the story ended there. Obviously, you are the children of Israel reading this. You know exactly what happens. You know that this is not a problem. But I want you to stop and think that, because Abraham has lived his whole life. And Abraham dies at the moment going, the land is kind of secured. And the seed? Well, it's not my job anymore. Like, my kid has a wife. There we go. But then. The narrative throws that little wrinkle in the thing to be like, look at how God prospered Abraham, and look at how God proffered Ishmael, and look at all these kids everywhere. And then let's look over at Isaac. He can't have kids. And that's where the narrative, and you're like, oh, let's do it. You're doing it again. And so that's where this narrative is, is basically Isaac, but look what Isaac does. He entreats the Lord for his wife, and then it solves it in the same verse. And the Lord was entreated, and Rebekah, his wife, conceived. And verse 22, and the children struggled together within her, and she said, if it be so, why am I thus? And she went to inquire of the Lord, and so she got these two kids fighting inside. You know, it's bad enough when they fight in your house. It's even worse when they're fighting inside you. 23, and the Lord said unto her, two nations are in thy womb, and two manner of people shall be separated from thy bowels. The one people shall be stronger than the other people, and the elder shall serve the younger. And so we'll leave it there because, again, her first problem was, I can't have kids. And then when she had kids, she's like, my kids won't stop fighting. They started fighting the moment they were conceived, and they will not stop fighting for the rest of their history. And that's going to lead to a whole lot of conflict as well. So Lord Willen, we'll pick up here in a few weeks. We'll continue our Genesis series. But we're going to put a pause in the series for the summer.