Genesis 26 God's Promises Hold True

Prayer for Attentive Hearts and the Authority of God’s Word

Heavenly Father, thank you for another opportunity to study your word. We pray that you would help us now to have attentive ears and change our hearts by your holy word. These are the very words of God.

Help us to treat them as such. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen. Never saw his lips move first. Mine?

You're on camera. I thought that's who. He was praying. Oh, all right. Never saw his lips move. Times of trouble are things that we go through. I got news for you. God, Jesus prayed to the Father. I don't pray that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them in the world.

So things that are going to happen aren't going to feel like we would understand it. We, in our pastor's time this morning, we were in Ecclesiastes 4. This is a new book for me. I've never really in-depth studied Ecclesiastes.

All I ever knew of Ecclesiastes, vanity, vanity, it's all vanity and chasing after the wind. But if you really get into the book of Ecclesiastes, it's as powerful and deep and profound as the book of Proverbs.

So we're in chapter four, and kind of in the middle of it, around verse eight, it talks about one person fighting against one person, you may not prevail. And then it talks about, but when you're with two, you're stronger.

And a cord of three cannot be broken. And it talks about the reality of difficult times, dealing through difficult times. But at the end of the day, even you're dealing with other people, it's the strength of the Holy Spirit.

Jeff, I absolutely loved your picture last Sunday of a football line of scrimmage, where you have the offensive line on one side and the defensive line on the other side, and given any other factors, they're just gonna go head to head and maybe not push one way or the other.

But then comes along the backfield, the Holy Spirit, and everything moves because of the power of the Holy Spirit. Push, push. Genesis is gonna take us through many, many opportunities for those who are following after God to either rely on God or take it on themselves and try to fix it.

Spoiler alert, when they try to fix it on their own, they mess it up. But I think that there is such teaching in the scriptures that says when there are times of difficulty, that's when you have to take the moment to pray and to seek God's help.

Nehemiah’s Quick Prayer in a Crisis

The book of Nehemiah is one of my favorite in this regard. It opens up in chapter one, where Nehemiah, who is still in captivity, he did not go with the first return of exiles, he hears about the conditions of the wall and his heart is broken, and he prays.

He seeks after God. Nehemiah has a job. He's the cupbearer to the king, which gives him access to the king. He's a trusted advisor to the king, but when the king calls, he comes, and you don't go in front of the king with sadness on your face.

You come into the king's presence joyfully because that's what he expects. Well, Nehemiah gets called in in the midst of this knowledge of what's going on. With the walls. And he comes in with a sad countenance, and the king says, hey dude, what's going on?

Let's paraphrase. And so he has the chance to ask and to tell the king what's going on. And the scripture says, and so I prayed and asked the king. Now, my imagination of what is going on as I read that account does not have Nehemiah saying, be with you in a minute, getting down on his knees and being in a prayerful position in front of God.

That's a good thing to do in prayer, but I don't think that's what happened. Not in that situation. I call it a Nehemiah dart. And so as this challenge is coming on, instead of just charging full speed into resolving the challenge, he says, God, I need you right now.

Even a quick silent prayer. God, I need you right now. And then he goes into the king. Isaac is faced with a problem. In fact, he's gonna be faced with a couple of problems. And it appears that as he starts into the solution, God has to get his attention and said, think about what you're doing.

Come back to me, think about what you're doing. And so Isaac is going to demonstrate, first of all, that when he tries to make decisions, they may not be the right one. And in fact, I don't think he's learned lessons from his old man, because his dad has done the same thing himself.

Isaac, the Famine, and God’s Covenant Promise

So we're in Genesis 26. Rick, I'm gonna ask you to give us the first six verses. Isaac is gonna seek help from a Bible doctor.

Now there was a famine in the land. Besides that, the king of the Philistines said, do not go down to Egypt. Dwell in the land of which I shall tell you. Sojourn in this land, and I will be with you. For to you and to your people, and I will establish the oath that I swore to Abraham, your father.

I will multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven, and will give to your offspring all these lands. And in your offspring, all the nations of the earth shall be blessed. Because Abraham obeyed my voice and kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws.

So they, I'm sorry, go ahead. So Isaac settled in Gerar. Okay, that's good, that's good. Ah, that is verse six, thank you. Famine in the land, not the first time we've seen this episode. And the last time we saw it, it had to do with Abraham, and there's famine in the land.

Now, it's interesting, Abraham has this issue, and he's gonna take action, and he's going to go somewhere where he thinks he's gonna get help. Isaac is doing the same thing. If we go into Genesis chapter 10, Abraham is gonna go, and Gerar, where Gerar is located is somewhat questioned.

Some put it closer to the Gaza Strip, some put it further inland, not far from Kadesh. But it would be on a main road on the way down to Egypt. And so for Abraham, he was concerned about a family, he was concerned about the survival.

And so he gathered his family, basically at that time, Sarah, and they head down to Egypt. And God doesn't seem to give him any directions one way or the other. God allows Abraham to complete the journey and to go all the way down.

But then he has another famine, and he stops partway, because maybe he's met the folks in Gerar, and he goes down, and he settles in with Abimelech. But in each case, he's got the same problem dealing with it.

So now we have Isaac, and Isaac has the famine in the land again. And as perhaps he's heard, perhaps you're going to get protection the further south you go. And I'm reading into this section here because of verse two, that it was his intent to go all the way to Egypt.

Because the Lord says, don't go to Egypt. So as he's going down, his first stop is in Gerar, with an intent to go all the way down to Egypt. And in this case, God says, don't go to Egypt. In the scriptures, going to Egypt and getting involved with Egypt predominantly is a position of danger.

It is a position of those who are not of God, those who would be in opposition to God. And it's interesting that God allowed Abraham to get all the way down to Egypt without stopping him, but he doesn't allow Isaac to go that far.

He says, don't go there. Don't sojourn down there. Go to the land. He's really stopping Isaac from taking a step that perhaps might be a step too far for him. Further on down, Jacob's going to be given a similar situation, and God is going to tell him, go to Egypt.

And reading some of the commentaries, the difference of them is perhaps can be described and understood in context with 1 Corinthians 10, 13, where it talks about we're gonna be tempted. God won't let you be tempted beyond that which you're able.

He provides the way of escape. And perhaps there's a certain understanding that God says, Abraham is going to follow me. He's going to fall and stumble, but I'm gonna allow him to go there. Jacob is strong enough, I want him to go there.

I want him to be seen that he has to rely on me in midst of severe temptation. But maybe there's something about Isaac that he says, it's not a good idea for Isaac even to go there. And I think that to a certain extent, God allowing us in his sovereignty to go where we should go or where we should not go.

It's a little picture here of God taking Isaac and protecting him from a danger that he doesn't want him to be exposed to. Now, he is going down at this time to Gerar. Geographically speaking, Gerar is part of the promised land.

So he actually has not left the promised land. And in the promised land, Abraham and Isaac are promised that he will bless them, he will multiply them, he will be their Lord and God. The Philistines are living in Gerar.

They haven't been removed yet. That happens, it's supposed to happen at the time of Joshua. But this is actually part of the promised land. Isaac hasn't left the promised land. So he's going to be going down there.

What I do find interesting is the phrase at the end of this section in verse five, because Abraham obeyed my voice, kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws. God is giving a lot of accolades to Abraham for being a man of faith.

What has Abraham done that might challenge that question? Tell him you're my sister. Tell him you're my sister. Twice, two different times. Tell him you're my sister. But I find it encouraging, again, in scripture here, where Abraham is called a man of faith.

In fact, he's in Hebrews 11. And in fact, if you go back to Genesis 15, it says, and he believed, and it was counted unto him as righteousness. And it's not the fact that Abraham was sinless. It's just that he had faith.

Think about David. David is known as a man after God's own heart. What did he do with Bathsheba? What did he do to Uriah the Hittite? And my point here is that God sees the heart of man. And despite the fact that there are sins and there are falls, God is still, in his love, he is willing to see into the heart, is the heart after God.

I was challenged yesterday by a young man about the appropriateness of God to place Adam and Eve in the garden, a perfect garden, except that there was a tree that could create all kinds. So it really wasn't perfect.

So is God really a loving God when he would put Adam and Eve in a garden, knowing that they would eat? Because don't eat that fruit. They'll eat that fruit. Is that a loving God? I got a problem with the Bible.

And so we talked about the fact that, yes, God placed them there. He allowed them to have a choice. He knew that they would not follow the choice, but he had already planned to send his son to die on the cross to pay the penalty for that sin.

That's a loving God. So we had that kind of conversation. So here's Isaac. He is stuck. He's got a famine and he has to go somewhere to protect his family. And perhaps having heard his father's stories, Gerard is a good place to go.

And so he goes down there and he meets with Abimelech. Now, just as a, oh, by the way, we're talking like 90 years separated in events. This is not the same person. In the Philistines, Abimelech was a title kind of like Caesar or something like that.

That's not his name. His name is Abimelech. He is the king. And so it's not the same person that he's gonna, that's gonna come into play in a few minutes, oh, by the way. Stan, give me verses seven through 11.

Isaac and Abimelech: Fear, Deception, and Rebekah

When the men of that place, he said, Rebekah had been there long. King of the Philistines, Sir Abimelech, she is really your wife? Why do you say she is my sister? Because I thought on my mind, I said, what is this you have done to us?

One of the men might well have slept with your wife and you would have brought guilt upon us. So Abimelech gave orders to all the people. Anyone who molests this man or his wife shall surely be put to death.

Isaac planted crops in that land and the same year, retake hundredfold. Okay, that's gonna be good. We'll do that one in a minute.

All right, Isaac. So he's got a problem. He has a famine and he needs to be taking care of the famine as he goes down there. We gotta realize and remember that God has already promised to take care of and the descendants would be like the sand in the sea, the stars in the sky.

And if this is God's promise, the challenge would be, would God be so inept, unable or fickle that there's a famine that the family might die? The answer has to be no, but he's gonna have to take care of it.

So he goes to the presence of Abimelech. That's not right, but so far it's not a disaster. In this particular case, the men of the place have said, who is she? It wasn't Abimelech. In the previous time, it was Pharaoh.

He wanted to take her as his wife. In this case, it's just the men of the land. They see her, who is she? And Isaac's got the same problem that daddy had. He forgot the promises of God and he needed to fix and to protect himself.

Tell them, you're my sister. Because she was attractive in appearance. There's a common theme here in, by the way, Genesis, the woman being attractive in appearance. I love it. That being said, it's not said that she was taken into the harem or the presence of the king.

It's not said. In fact, it's pretty obvious that he is still able to be with Rebekah. Because after some period of time, the king looks out his window and he sees Isaac and Rebekah, perhaps canoodling.

Don't know exactly what was going on, but it was going on. The word here in the Greek, I believe I can pronounce it, vesak. In the Hebrew, I should say, vesak. In this case, it's being translated, you have caressing, and the ESV, I think it is, it says laughing.

But if we go back to Genesis 21 .9, Barbara, I'm gonna ask you to get Genesis 21 .9. Genesis 21 .9? Yes, I'm gonna ask you to get that. Here's Isaac, and the question is, why does Isaac pick a place in full plain view of the palace and have some sort of a interaction with his wife where it would be in full plain view of the king?

If he's going to be having some sort of opportunity to be with his wife, afraid that the men might see, are they, she's my, that doesn't make sense for him to be right out in the open in front of everybody doing it.

I would think he would be hiding somewhere doing this. Let's do this in private.

Yeah, Stan. Well, he said it's his sister, so he's showing the king, this is my sister, I'm protecting her, she's gonna be with me regardless of where I am or what I do.

This word has got two applications, this Nesach has two applications, and one of them has something to do with being physical and having pleasure with the woman. That's one application to it, but there's another application to the same word.

Give me 21 .9, I think it is.

21 .9, but Sarah saw that the son of Hagar, the Egyptian, had born to Abraham, was mocking. That's the same word.

Mocking. The same word can be applied either having some sort of pleasurable exchange with another woman, or it can be mocking. And in fact, the word Nesach has much the same root as the Hebrew word for Isaac, a mocker almost.

He is, according to the commentaries on this, intentionally putting himself in a position to be mocking the king. And enjoying the pleasure that he gets out of it anyway. He's definitely not finding the ability or the opportunity or taking the chance to be a godly man.

What he's doing in full view of the king, mocking the king, is what he's actually doing right now. The same very place he's trying to find protection. So Abimelech responds and he sees what's going on, and he says, hey dude, she's your wife.

Isn't she? Says, challenge to him, she's your wife, she's not just your sister. Why have you done this? And he said, well, I thought you'd kill me because of her. Does this sound familiar to you? Now the two things that I want to pick out here, one is that how much of what his father had experienced in Egypt and then in Gerar, how much had Abraham told Isaac about?

We don't know. We can presume, but we don't know. He was probably a legend. There you go, like father, like son. But let's at least take this. Who wrote the Pentateuch? Moses, well God, but Moses. And where did Moses get much of the information on what's recorded in Genesis and Exodus?

Now he obviously gets it from God, but from verbal tradition. I don't think it's a far stretch that the recordings that we have in earlier chapters of Genesis become part of the verbal tradition, and they could have been used by Abraham as object lessons, instruction points, moments of opportunity with his son to teach him.

But he doesn't seem to get it, even though the information had to be there. Who does get it? Abimelech. It doesn't say here, like it said in the other one, and God spoke to Abimelech, surely don't touch her because in the moment you do, you will die.

It doesn't say that that happens here. Abimelech says, what is this you've done to us? One of the people might easily have lain with your wife and you would have brought guilt on all of us. How does he know this?

I think he knew it from his father. A previous Abimelech. And so the lessons that were learned, somehow that did get passed on to Abimelech, but for whatever reason, Isaac just shut his eyes. Abimelech is not one who received the promises of God.

Isaac is. Abimelech is not a Yahweh worshiper, but yet he acts in righteousness here. Isaac is a man of supposedly Yahweh, and I really think he would have heard the stories, but he doesn't seem to get the lesson.

He is being pushed by the flesh in a way that Abimelech doesn't seem to be getting pushed in the flesh. I think the lessons from our forefathers should make a difference. That says two things. Listen to those in your family that are older than you, and then the other side, if you're the older in the family, just be ready to tell, not just the stories of God, but the lessons that you learn.

I made a mistake in this way, my son, my grandson. And here's where God stepped in, learned the lesson, and grow from it.

And Abimelech is the honorable one.

And Abimelech, in this case, is the honorable one, because then he puts the word out. Anybody who touches this man or his wife, I'm putting him to death. Earlier on, Pharaoh, God says, if you touch her, surely you will die.

This is at the hand of God. But Abimelech says, we're not even gonna let that happen. We're cutting it off now. Okay, so there's an opportunity now for Isaac and Rebekah to gain their freedom. And apparently, the famine is somewhat over.

Blessing, Wells, and Conflict Over the Promised Land

I'm gonna ask if you would read, please. It's a longer passage, 12 to 25.

Isaac planted crops in the land, and the same year the man became rich, he had so many flocks and herds and servants that the Philistines envied him. So all the wells that his father's servants had dug in the time, or had dug in the time of his father Abraham, filling them with earth.

Then Abimelech said, Isaac, move away from there, and encamped in the valley of Gerar, and settled there. And he reopened the well,.

And he gave them the same names. Okay, we're gonna stop there. This is gonna be a repetitive theme here right now. God is blessing Isaac, despite himself, at this point in time. But God is blessing Isaac.

It's said that he sowed, he reaped, became rich, all that he had. These are blessings that he's getting from God. And again, remember the promises. To your descendants, I'm gonna give this land and all this other kind of stuff.

When our approach is to allow God to be our God, blessings, blessings show up. The circumstances do not control the blessings. I wanna say, think about Joseph, he goes down to Egypt. Definitely the circumstances are against him.

We're gonna see that sometime in the next couple of years. But God blesses him, and it's God's choice to bless him. Isaiah 41, 10. Sue, if you would get that.

Yes. And fear not, for I am with you. Be not dismayed, for I will strengthen you. Yes, I will help you. I will uphold you with my righteous foot.

Isaac is in Gerar. There's been famine in the land. He's not in a place of, perhaps, ideal places for him. But it says that God blessed him. He planted, he got crops. He increased in wealth so much that Abimelech says, there's too much of you around here.

Please, please go your own way. And so they go, and now the issue is gonna be water and wells. And so they dig a well, and they get water. And the Philistines get envious of the fact that he's got water.

So they come in, and they oppose. And we have the first time they build, Isaac digs a well, and the Philistines come, and they stop it up, and they quarrel. The water is ours, and so Isaac says, fine, we're gonna leave the first well in Essex.

So they left. So they go to another place, and they dig another well, and they get water in Sitna. And here, the Philistines come again, and they come after them again. So they leave again, but God continually takes care of them.

And finally, they go to a place that's called Rehoboth, for there the Lord has made fruitful room for us. We now see the reality of Isaac and Abimelech for what they are. In the case of Isaac, despite himself, God is blessing him, and Isaac is being blessed, his wells and everything else are working.

But in the case of Abimelech, who had seemingly acted in a righteous way, saying, we're not gonna touch this woman, now he is going on the attack against Isaac, saying, this isn't right. God is blessing you too much, get out of here.

So now they dig a well. He said, this isn't right, that's our well. And so they leave there. So they dig another well, and Abimelech says, no, this is our well, too. And Abimelech just seems to be going hostile towards God, and the reality of what transpires between the Philistines and Isaac and his family is now a conflict.

Romans 8, 7, the mind of the flesh is hostile towards God. John 15, you are not of this world, so the world hates you. My mind, as I was reading this, went on to the reality of what's going on on our property.

Jeff and I, you had this conversation about two or three weeks ago, when we know that the long-eared bat doesn't exist. Praise God, we knew that all along, but now the state knows it. And so now we're looking for final authorizations so that we can build in the land.

And now the state says, you have a vernal pool. I'd never heard of a vernal pool, maybe you have. It's a pool that's dry, except for some seasons it has water. So we have a vernal pool. And that vernal pool might, not does, it might have some species, not this species, that dwell in it, and so now you need 150 yards separation.

And the question is, is this really a conflict between the state and somebody trying to build on property, or is this a deeper spiritual battle? Number two. You think it's number two. Now fortunately, God just continues to protect Isaac and they just continue to move on.

We want to build, no, there's a bat. Okay, well, let's get through that one. Now we want to build, oh, there's a vernal pool. And the state would want us to be defeated and to be discouraged, but we can't be because God is on our side.

God is gonna tell us where to go. And God moves Isaac and his clan to Rehoboth, where they do build a land. Let's go on from there, from 26 to the end. And Sue, could you read 26 to the end for us, please?

And Abimelech came to him.

So he said, let us make a covenant with you that you will do us no harm, since we have not sent you away in peace. So he made them in peace. Then they arose and said to him, we have found water. So he called it 40 years old.

Peace, Covenant, and the Danger of Compromise

Times of trial, perhaps failure, but then God's blessings, mercy, getting us through that time and showing his love in times of blessing. I think it's pretty common scripturally that following that time of victory through God and seemingly time of settlement, opposition is going to come.

And in this case, it initially comes in a very subtle backhanded way. Isaac and his people have moved away from Garar and they now have found a new well and they have settled down there. And while they are there, the men of the palace, I'm sorry, the bombers, Abimelech goes, his advisor and Clyco, the commander, and they go seek out Isaac.

And while it could look like a threat coming, what ends up happening is an olive branch peace, peace. The offer is to make a pact with us, that we would come to an agreement. We would come, in fact, the approach that they take, we have seen what has happened and we now know that you are blessed to the Lord.

These are very sweet, sugary, complimentary terms. And the intent there is to almost get Isaac to let his guard down and just enter into a pact with the world. What a danger that is. Now, again, he's gonna fail here because he's going to make a pact with them.

But I think the warning here is that there are attacks that are gonna come up against us. So Isaac had a famine. He sought help from the world. He went to Abimelech and then he failed because he was afraid for his life because of his wife.

But God worked through Abimelech to protect him from that failure and then blessed them and they get crops and they get flocks and they get water. And then there's a dispute over water, but he continually, continually gives it to him until finally they're settled down.

And once they're settled down, it's potentially human nature to let your guard down, to get off the prayer chain, to get off the knees of prayer because now here comes the enemy. It says, we wanna make peace with you because now we know that yours is the God, the true God.

And so come, be our friend. We need to watch out for that.

We need to see, yeah, Stan. I like this story about how God blessed Isaac. And he blessed him, but not only did he bless him, but they saw the blessing. They saw that he was discouraged, discouraged, discouraged, but they saw the blessings of God and yet they still did not worship God because God has blessed the owner of his company and I'm riding his coattail.

He's not really blessing me, but I'm getting his blessing because I've been very faithful to God.

It's important for us when things go well to have enough faith to give God the credit. But it's also so important for us to be aware of worldly opportunities to find new peace in a worldly opportunity way that is perhaps not God's plan for us in the first place.

And I think Isaac kind of fails in this one at this point in time. He makes a great feast. They eat and drink and they exchange oaths. But God continues to bless him because after that, the servants come and say, we dug another well and we called it Sheba.

The name of that place is Beersheba and God does continue to bless them. God is bigger than our failures, I guess is my point there. The second opposition now comes almost from within. Esau is his brother.

And it says that Esau took Judith, the daughter of Beeri, the Hittite, to be his wife and Baismith, the daughter of Elam, the Hittite. When it was time to get a wife, what did his father do when it was time to find a wife?

What did Abraham do when it was time to find a wife for Isaac? He sent his servant to find one. Where? Home, to family. Send the servant elsewhere. Does he want to marry the... Those insight, those knowledge.

This is not the place for you to get your wife. Now, God had prepared Rebekah. We've talked about that one already. That's an amazing story. But here we have Esau, who is willing to find the wife amongst the Canaanites, in this case, the Hittites.

Should not be so. And how does that turn out for Esau and for Isaac? Verse 35, and they made life bitter for Isaac and Rebekah. The takeaway from this section is we're gonna come out of times of difficulty and we're gonna come through this question of are we part of the EFCA or are we not?

And we're eventually gonna come through the question of are we gonna build a building there? Are we gonna need another building? And God is going to give us his answer and we're going to settle in to that new way of life.

I think that's when we're vulnerable, is when we finally settle in to what God has shown us and what God has given us. That's the time that we need to not be figuring we've got control of it. Judy, I'm gonna ask you to get to Proverbs 3, verses five and six.

I think the takeaway for this chapter is who do you trust and where do you get your choices? How do you decide which way you should go? There's a way that the heart would want you to go because the way of the world.

But God has a much, much more important way. If you've got Proverbs 3, verses five and six. Trust in the Lord. That's our way. And I think that's really the message in so many ways that it's taught throughout this chapter.

Trusting the Lord’s Guidance Over the Way of the World

Jeff, could you close us in prayer?

Father God, thank you so much for this word today. So penetrating, so applicable. Lord, we pray that you would bring this church into Rehoboth, Lord, into broad places, into room, as that word means. And Lord, as you continue to bless us, Lord, we see the power of your hand on this church.

We pray that there would be a similar Beersheba, a similar oath, a similar pact, that we would do no harm, that we would participate and be friends with those around us, Lord. So lead us to those who are godly, who would stand with us, and help us to come into a peaceful place.

Lord, as far as that depends on us, your word says, live at peace with all men, as far as that depends on you, in Romans 12, 18. So Lord, give us that peace with surrounding peoples, but help us, Lord, to never compromise the truth, never compromise the word for unity with the world.

We don't wanna do that, Lord. We just pray for your blessing and that open place that you would give us, in Jesus' name, amen.

Amen, thank you. And I stopped at 28, so you can take 29 if you want. The stew. Gotcha. No, wait a minute, that's chapter 25. Oh, yeah, yeah, we got it. I'll pick up at chapter 27. Yes, you will. Yeah.

Yes. Isaac is so old, he can't see.