A Bride for the Son

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Take out your Bibles with me and turn to Genesis 24.
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Now I want us to recognize that we have arrived at the longest chapter in this book.
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And my goal is to preach this whole chapter today.
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But I do want to point out to you that there is an entire section of this chapter that is a repetition.
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And so there will be portions we won't read.
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My intention originally was to read the whole thing, but I sat down and read the whole thing, and it took 15 minutes to read the whole thing, and I figured a 45 minute sermon, well 15 minutes of the Word of God wouldn't be bad, but it would take a lot of time to read through it.
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So I encourage you, we're going to read the first portion and the last portion, and I'm going to encourage you in your own time to read through the whole thing.
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If you would, and I did tell you last week to read it before today, and I'm not going to ask for a show of hands for seeking to embarrass anyone, but I did ask that you would read it before we got here.
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So you probably noticed that there's a certain portion where it, and this is very common in Hebrew literature that stories will repeat themselves.
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And remember, the Word of God was kept in the mind before it was kept on paper, and before people were able to take books home with them, they took it home in their minds.
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And so often the repetition in the text was a way to keep the memory of the text in the minds and hearts of the people.
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And the Bible says we're to hide the Word of God in our hearts so that we will not sin against God.
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So there's a reason why there's so much repetition in God's Word.
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So we know that, it's important.
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And I'm not saying there's no value in us reading it both, but for the sake of my voice and for the sake of time, we're not going to read the entire chapter.
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And I do want to make another point before we read this morning.
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In our hermeneutics class right now that I am teaching on Thursday nights, I am teaching the outline of Bible exposition, how to study as observation, interpretation, and application.
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The third portion being how to apply the text.
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And one of the things that I try to remind my class is that sometimes application is the hard part because we want to moralize passages that aren't intended to give us lessons.
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And for instance, the reason why I'm saying this here, this is not a blueprint for how to find a godly wife.
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So if you're having trouble finding a godly spouse, I don't recommend you go get ten camels and go look for a woman drawing water out of a well.
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Just to be clear, this is not necessarily a blueprint for that.
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Neither is it proposing a methodology for discerning God's will.
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Even though I am going to point out at a certain point in the text that it's not wrong to ask God what his desires are.
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What we see in this story is we see a servant, and we don't even get his name.
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I'm going to tell you who I think he is when we get there, but we don't even get his name.
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We just get a man who is devoted to the will of God, and he wants the will of God to be lived out in his life.
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And every moment he has to make a decision, he stops, and he asks God to be clear about what his will is.
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And I love that.
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I mean, in that, that's enough.
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But what I'm saying is next time you're having to make a decision whether to go north or go south, I don't recommend, you know, necessarily going out and getting those ten camels.
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That's my point, is we've got to be careful how we apply the text, and we don't try to over-moralize a story.
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Rather, we find in it the nuggets of wisdom that are there, and then we learn about the providence of God, because that really is the overarching message, is that God is providential in giving a bride to the son of Abraham.
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And that's what this story is about.
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And then as we get to the end, we're going to see how, I believe, that points to God giving a bride to his son, the Lord Jesus Christ.
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So with all that being said, we're only going to read verses 1 to 9 as we stand.
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We always do stand for the reading of God's Word that we're going to hear preached.
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So we stand together, beginning at verse 1.
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We're going to read verse 9, and then I'm going to pray.
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Now Abraham was old, well advanced in years, and the Lord had blessed Abraham in all things.
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And Abraham said to his servant, the oldest of his household, who had the charge of all that he had, Put your hand under my thigh that I may make you swear by the Lord, the God of heaven and earth, that you will not take a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, among whom I dwell, but will go to my country and to my kindred and take a wife for my son Isaac.
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The servant said to him, Perhaps the woman may not be willing to follow me to this land.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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So the servant put his hand under the thigh of Abraham, his master, and swore to him concerning this matter.
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My Father and my God, I thank you for this day.
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I pray, O God, even now, that you would give me an extra measure of your spirit to preach your word with boldness and conviction.
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I pray that you would give me strength of body and of mind and of voice.
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And I pray that you'll keep me from error, for, Lord, I am a fallible man and capable of preaching error, and I don't want to, for the sake of your name, for the sake of your people, and for the sake of my own life.
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For, Lord God, you do not deal well with those who mistreat your word.
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So I pray that I would never mistreat your word in this pulpit or anywhere.
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God, I pray that you would be glorified today in the preaching of your word.
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Save sinners, O God, and sanctify saints.
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In Christ's name, amen.
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In our last study of Genesis, we read about the death of Sarah, the wife of Abraham.
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And we read about how only two verses of that chapter gave us the picture of Abraham weeping and mourning over his wife.
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And then 18 verses of that chapter dealt with a land negotiation that Abraham made with the sons of Heth, otherwise known as the Hittites.
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But I want you to understand something.
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Even though Sarah's death was only two verses of that last chapter, Sarah's death still looms heavily over chapter 24.
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Because the reason why Abraham is now focusing on getting a wife for his son is because what we find at the end of this chapter is that his son is still reeling over the loss of his mother.
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In fact, I'll show you that since we didn't read all that way.
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If you'll go down to the end of the chapter, this is after all of the events have taken place.
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Verse 66.
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Isaac is there, the servant is there, Rebekah is there.
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Again, everything's taken place.
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We'll get to the story in a moment, but listen to what it says.
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It says, And the servant told Isaac all the things that he had done.
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Then Isaac brought her into the tent of Sarah his mother, and took Rebekah, and she became his wife.
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And he loved her.
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So Isaac was comforted after his mother's death.
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So we see this chapter, chapter 24, the longest chapter in Genesis, 67 verses, still really is a continuation of what happened in chapter 23.
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The death of Isaac's mother weighed heavily upon his heart, and Isaac knew it.
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He knew that Isaac not only needed a bride for procreation, he not only needed a bride to fulfill the promise of the covenant that God had made, he needed a bride for comfort and strength.
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The Bible tells us that Adam was created, and God said it was not good that he be alone, and he made him what? He made him one who was meet help for him, or one who was a helper, one who was appropriately designed to be the comforter and helper to him, the one who was to come alongside him and support him and love him, and the two would become what? One flesh.
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And what we're seeing here is Abraham knows his son needs a wife.
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Abraham wants to get a wife for his son.
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And that's what leads us into chapter 24.
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It says in verse 1, Now Abraham was old, well advanced in years, and the Lord had blessed Abraham in all things.
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And Abraham said to his servant, the oldest of his household who had charge of all that he had, put your hand under my thigh.
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Now, I want to explain something.
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The text never names this man.
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The text never tells us who this servant is, but I have a proposition of who I think it is.
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And you know how dangerous it is when a pastor says, I think.
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So sometimes it's not even good to go there.
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But in this case, I think it's safe enough that I can tell you what I think.
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And if you think different, we can talk about it later.
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It's not that big a deal, but I do think it's important to point this out.
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If you go back to chapter 15 of Genesis, there is a man named, his name was Eleazar.
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He was Abraham's adopted son.
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He was a servant.
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You remember when God said, your descendants are going to be like the sea, or the stars of the sky, rather like the sand of the sea, the stars of the sky.
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And Abraham said, but I don't even have a son.
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All I have is this servant, Eleazar of Damascus.
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Is he the one who is going to carry on my lineage? Is he the one that's in? And God said, No, you're going to have a son through your own loins.
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He's going to come through your own seed.
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It won't be this adopted son.
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Now God was not discounting the value of adopted children.
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I have two of my own.
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God uses adoption as a blessed picture of the gospel in the New Testament, where we're adopted into the family of God.
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So there's nothing wrong with adoption.
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But in this moment, God was telling Abraham, the promise is not going to come through your adopted son.
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It's going to come through your own line.
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But I have a feeling in my heart, this is the man, Eleazar.
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And here's something else to say about this man.
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If that is in fact who this is, then what we have here is the man who would have gotten all that Isaac has.
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He would have been the inheritor of all that Isaac possesses.
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But now Isaac is the one possessing it.
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And we don't find in this man a spirit of bitterness.
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We don't find in this man a spirit of jealousy or hatred.
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But what we find in this man is a spirit that loves his master and loves the Lord.
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And he's willing to be a servant.
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You know, where does the spirit of jealousy come from? When we're not willing to do what God has called us to do.
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When we see what somebody else has and say, boy, I deserve that.
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It's where that 10th commandment comes in about coveting.
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I see what somebody else has and say, you know what, I deserve that.
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But we don't see that spirit in this man.
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If in fact I am correct to say this is who it is, we don't see that spirit in him.
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But instead we see a spirit who loves Abraham and loves Isaac.
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And he's willing to submit to his master's commands.
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So Abraham says, come and put your hand under my thigh.
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That's another portion that's a little awkward for us because we don't do that today.
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If my child and I are entering into a promissory relationship, and you know how that goes.
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Daddy, will you do X for me? And I say, yes, son.
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He says, do you promise? I don't say, well, come put your hand under my thigh and we'll make a promise.
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That's not how we do it.
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But we do have in our world a similar methodology when you go to court and you have to give testifying words, you go under what's called under oath.
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And to lie under oath is in our legal system a crime.
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And what do you do when you go under oath? Well, at least you used to.
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I don't know if they do it this way anymore.
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But used to you would come and put your hand on the word of God.
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You'd put your hand on a Bible.
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And you would say, I swear to tell the truth.
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The whole truth.
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Because we know a half truth is a whole lie.
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So we swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth.
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So help me, God.
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So we understand the concept of putting our hand on something and swearing by that thing.
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Now we have to take a step back and say, but why the thigh? Why didn't he tell him to put his hand over his heart? That's how we give the Pledge of Allegiance, put our hand over our heart.
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No, he put his hand under the thigh.
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And there's a lot of debate about this.
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And I'm not going to spend a thousand years trying to convince you one way or another.
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But I'll give you a few thoughts as to why the thigh.
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The thigh in Hebrew writing, and especially, and I did look this up through the Bible, we see the thigh connected to the loins.
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And so it could be, it's almost like when you put your hand under someone's thigh, you're saying you swear on my children.
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You're swearing on procreation.
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You're swearing on your livelihood.
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Another thing could be that the loins is where the covenant circumcision was made.
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And it could be saying, it's almost like putting my hand on the Bible.
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I'm swearing by the covenant.
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But one rabbi said this, and I did print this.
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I wanted to quote him directly.
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This is Rabbi Ibn Ezra.
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He said the phrase under the thigh is literally that.
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And what it is, is someone sits on the hand of another person to establish a position of authority.
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So by putting your hand under the, essentially under the seat of someone, you are saying I'm at your behest.
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I'm at your command.
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You're sitting on my hand.
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My hand is yours to do with.
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So again, these are all options.
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We weren't there.
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We don't have any extra biblical literature to really dial in.
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But we do know this, this same thing happens later in the Bible.
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In Genesis 47, 29, when Jacob tells Joseph to put his hand under his thigh to promise him that he's going to bury him in the promised land.
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So this was a custom of the day, similar to our putting our hand on the Bible and making an oath and swearing a promise.
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Abraham, put your hand under my thigh and you promise me.
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And what's the promise? The promise was simple.
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You are not going to take for my son a wife from the women of the Canaanites.
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Now, a couple things we can draw out of that.
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One, it was up to the servant to get the wife.
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He didn't tell him you're going to go get a wife.
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He said don't go get a wife from the Canaanites, which means it was already understood that that was his job.
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It was his job to go and retrieve a wife.
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And he says I don't want you to retrieve a wife from the Canaanites.
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Why? Because the Canaanites were a wicked people.
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And I want to point out to you and remind you that the Bible tells us that the wicked often have much more influence over the good rather than the good influencing the bad.
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The Bible says what about immoral company? I can't for the life of me think of the verse right now, but you know what does it say? Bad company corrupts good morals.
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Thank you, Brother Mike.
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It just flew out of my mind, but you understand.
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Bad company corrupts good morals.
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And so Abraham says no, you're not going to take a wife for my child from among these pagan women.
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But rather, you are going to go back to my homeland and you're going to get a wife for my son from my relatives.
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Now for us in modern day, we might feel a little weird about that because we don't go to the family reunion looking for a wife.
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Well, if you're from here, maybe.
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But in general, we don't go to the family reunion looking for a wife.
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But this is Abraham.
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He says you're going to go and you're going to get a wife from my household.
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You're not going to get a wife from these wicked neighbors of ours.
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She will not be a Canaanite.
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She is going to be really one of the daughters of Abraham's ancestors.
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She's going to be a Shemite.
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Now just for historical reminder, Abraham is from the line of Shem.
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The Canaanites are from the line of Ham, that cursed line.
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And that could be another reason why you're not going to take a wife from that line.
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You're going to take a wife from my line, a line of the Shemites.
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So, the other thing he asked, he said, well what if I go and she won't come? Do you want me to take him over there? And Abraham said, no.
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You are not to take him out of this land.
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Remember, God's promise to Abraham had two specific points.
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He were to give him a land and a seed.
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Now the seed is fulfilled in Isaac, who will then have Jacob and Esau.
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And out of Jacob, his name will change to Israel.
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And Israel will give him twelve.
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And out of that twelve will be the nation of Israel.
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But the land is also part of the promise.
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So Abraham says, do not take my son out of this land.
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Because he's going to stay right here.
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This is his land.
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You go get her and you bring her back.
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You don't take him over there, you bring her over here.
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And so the servant, and understand, I really have a lot of respect for the servant.
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I think he is one of the most important side characters in the Bible.
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When I say side characters, most people don't even know him.
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We certainly don't know his name for certain.
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But he's so important, because as we'll see, he's so in tune with God.
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And he's praying to God every moment.
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But he says, what if she won't come? And then Abraham, being that kind hearted patriarch, he says, then you're released from your duty.
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If you go over there and you find the woman and she won't come here, it's obvious she ain't the right one.
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And you're released from this command.
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So he's got his marching orders.
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He's got the commands from Abram.
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He knows what he's supposed to do.
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Now let's see him do it.
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We begin that in verse 14.
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Then the servant took ten of his master's camels and departed, taking all sorts of choice gifts from the master.
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And he rose and went to Mesopotamia, to the city of Nahor.
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Remember, Nahor is Abraham's brother.
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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 the water.
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And he said, O Lord, God of my master Abraham, please grant me success today and show steadfast love to my master Abraham.
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Behold, I am standing by the spring of water, and the daughters of the men of the city are coming out to draw water.
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Let the young woman to whom I 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.
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By this I shall know that you have shown steadfast love to my master.
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Alright, so here's the deal.
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This guy, this servant, he takes ten camels filled with all kinds of good stuff.
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We're going to see later, it's all kinds of stuff.
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It's gold, it's all kinds of treasures.
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Because he's going to get a wife, and wives weren't cheap.
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Amen indeed.
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He's going to get a wife, and he's taking all these treasures.
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He does not want the dowry to be the issue.
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He does not want the bride price to come up short.
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So he takes the ten camels and he goes.
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And he finds himself in the city of Nahor.
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This is the land where Abraham's relatives live.
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It was about a 500 mile journey based on some of the things I looked at this week.
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So you figure it's several weeks of travel with them ten camels in tow.
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And he comes up and he has the camels kneel down.
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And he prays and he says, God, oh by the way, you know where he went.
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He went where the ladies gather.
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If you're looking for a woman, go where the women are.
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I mean, that may be one of the young men looking for a wife.
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You've got to know where the women are.
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He knew where the women were.
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They were getting water in the evening.
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They went in the evening because it was cooler in the evening.
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They didn't go out in the middle of the day.
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They went in the evening.
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And we remember, if you go fast forward a little bit to John chapter 4, there was a woman who went out in the middle of the day.
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And she went out because she was not welcome with the other women.
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It was the woman at the well that Jesus came to.
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So there's a little historical connection there.
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But he went to the evening and he had his camels kneel down.
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And he says, okay God, here's what I'd like for you to do for me.
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And by the way, I don't mean to make that sound in any way irreverent.
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Because this guy is super reverent.
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By the way, the covenant name of God is used 19 times in this chapter.
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Yahweh, Yahweh, Yahweh.
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When he says in verse 12, O Yahweh, God of my master, grant me success today.
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He knows God.
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He calls him the God of Abraham, but that doesn't mean he's not his God any more than when you say Yahweh is the God of Abraham.
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He's not your God.
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He's not denying that he's a follower of God or trusting in God.
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He just knows who this God is.
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He's the God of Abraham.
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He's the God who called Abraham out of this same land, called him into the promised land, and now has sent him back to this land to bring out a wife.
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And he says, O Lord, God of my master, please grant me success today.
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And then he gives God a little outline.
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He says, when I see the woman come, and I ask her for a drink, and she gives it to me, and then she offers to water my camels, then I will know that this is the woman you've chosen.
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Now again, as I said, this isn't necessarily a blueprint, but there is some wisdom here, because he's saying this is what I'm looking for.
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I'm looking for a woman who is concerned with hospitality and who is strong.
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I'm going to tell you a little something.
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Watering him, not a problem, but watering them camels, now that's a chore.
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That's a chore that she is offering to do.
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If you notice in the text, he didn't say, I'm going to ask her to water my camels.
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He said, I'm going to ask her for a drink, and she's going to offer to water my camels.
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Now depending on what commentary you read, some of them read a little differently, but they all kind of express about the same thing at this point, and that is that a standard camel drinks about 25 gallons at a shot, and a standard water pitcher that she would have been carrying on her shoulder held about three gallons, and he's got ten camels, and there would have been a big stone watering trough that had to be filled for the camels to come drink out of, and she would have had to walk down steps to get to the well, pull that up, walk back up, and pour water into that stone cistern, and it would have taken about 80-something times.
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There's a reason why I don't have anything to do with calculating around here.
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But I know this, it's 250 gallons.
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25 gallons per camel, ten camels is 250 gallons.
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That's about 80 trips.
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So let's read on.
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I want to show you something that's funny.
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Because this is what it says in verse 15.
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It says, Before he had finished speaking, this is him praying, Before he had finished speaking, behold, Rebekah, who was born to Bethuel, the son of Milcah, the wife of Nahor, by the way, that's Abraham's brother, so this is his grandniece.
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Abraham's brother came out with her water jar on her shoulder.
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The young woman was very attractive in appearance, a maiden whom no man had known.
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I don't know how, I mean, we know how God knows, but I have no idea how the guy knew that, that she was a virgin.
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Maybe there was something she was wearing that indicated that she was not married.
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But that's the only way I can think of it.
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Like how would he know that this is a virgin maiden? But it's clear that somehow he does.
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She went down to the spring, filled her jar, came up, and then the servant ran to meet her and said, Please give me a drink.
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And he says, A little water to drink from your jar.
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She said, Drink, my lord.
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And she quickly let down the jar upon her hand and gave him a drink.
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And when she had finished giving him a drink, she said, I will draw water for your camels also until they have finished drinking.
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Until they have finished.
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She's going to fill them up.
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So she quickly emptied her jar into the trough, ran again to the well to draw water, and she drew for all his camels.
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Verse 21, The man gazed at her in silence to learn whether the Lord had prospered his journey or not.
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So if it did in fact take 80 trips, and we don't know for sure.
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Maybe she didn't fill them to the brim.
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But if it did in fact take multiple trips, old dudes just watching.
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Now it could be that he was an older man.
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And she didn't expect him to help.
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However, I don't know about the guys in the room.
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If a lady was pouring water in a trough, after about the third trip, I'd be helping her out or at least offering.
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He didn't do nothing.
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He just watched.
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The whole time.
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Down and up and down and up and down.
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And as Brother Brian Boardman said, she had to think this guy was the biggest jerk she ever saw.
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Let him go back and forth putting the water in.
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But he's watching her, and he's seeing not only the physical beauty of this woman, but he's seeing her strength and her character.
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She said she's going to do something, and she does it.
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And so down and up she goes, bringing the water to the camels.
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And she passes the test.
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This is the test.
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This is it.
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This is the one.
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So, verse 22.
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When the camels had finished drinking, the man took a gold ring, weighing a half a shekel, and two bracelets for her arms, weighing ten gold shekels, and said, Please tell me whose daughter you are.
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Is there room in your father's house for us to spend the night? She said, I am the daughter of Bethuel, the son of Milca, whom she bore to Nahor.
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She added, We have plenty of straw and fodder and room to spend the night.
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And the man bowed his head and worshipped the Lord, because he knew.
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Verse 26.
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He knew.
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He bowed his head right then.
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He said, Thank you God.
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He said, Blessed be the Lord.
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Verse 27.
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The God of my master Abraham, who has not forsaken his steadfast love, and his faithfulness toward my master.
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And as for me, the Lord has led me in the way to the house of my master's kinsmen.
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Then the young woman ran and told her mother's household about these things.
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This guy.
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This is it.
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This is her.
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This is it.
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This is what I was hoping would happen.
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This is what I prayed would happen.
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This is what I asked God to do, and God did it.
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Not only is she hospitable, but she is hospitable with the water for the camels.
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She's hospitable with her house.
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Come.
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Stay in our house.
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Come.
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We have plenty of food, plenty of fodder, plenty of everything.
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Come.
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And so the man worships God for all that God has done.
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By the way, this just continues.
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This guy's worship, his attitude of worship continues as he sees the providence of God in his hand working out in his life.
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Then we get to verse 29.
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It says, Rebecca had a brother whose name was Laban.
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Laban ran out toward the man to the spring.
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As soon as he saw the ring and bracelets on his sister's arms and heard the word of Rebecca, his sister, thus this man spoke to me.
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He went out to the man, and behold, he was standing by the camels at the spring.
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He said, Come on in, O blessed of the Lord.
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Why do you stand outside? For I have prepared a house and a place for your camels.
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So the man came to the house and unharnessed the camels and gave straw and fodder to the camels.
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And there was water to wash his feet, the feet of the men who were with him.
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And then food was set before them to eat.
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But he said, I will not eat until I have said what I have come here to say.
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And Laban said, Speak on.
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Now for a moment before we get to the next portion, because the next portion is the repetition portion, I just want to point out this man Laban.
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If you're unfamiliar with Bible history, or maybe you haven't read much in Genesis recently, Laban will come back into the story later, and we will learn some more about his character that we don't know now, but we can start to pick up at least a little bit now on Laban.
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Laban is the brother of Rebekah, and later on when Isaac runs away from home, and he runs to his uncle Laban's home, and Laban is going to, as many of you will remember, will basically be somewhat of a conniving fellow when it comes to dealing with his brother.
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The big one was the night of the wedding.
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Those who don't remember, he thinks that he's laying down with one sister, and he wakes up to find that he's in bed with the other one.
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So this guy has a future history.
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When I say future history, we know what kind of a man he is based on what we learn later.
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But we can kind of see the seed form of that now, because Laban has this man come to his house, and he's excited to welcome him in.
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Why is he excited to welcome him in? Because he knows old dude's rich.
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That's why.
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I mean, you can say it as simple as you want, but as soon as this woman gave the water to the camels, he puts bracelets on her arms that are very heavy with the weight, and a nose.
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And by the way, it wasn't a ring on her finger.
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He put a ring in her nose.
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That would have been the standard gift.
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And so he, boom, puts a ring on her nose, rings on her wrist.
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So he sees this, and what does he see? He sees dollar signs, y'all.
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Of course you can stay the night.
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I'm like Airbnb for people who've got money.
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Of course you can come.
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And so Laban's hospitality may not have been as noble as his sister.
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Rebecca's hospitality was from the heart, but Laban's maybe not so.
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And again, you might think I'm being too hard on him.
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I'm just reading in this what I know about him later.
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And what we're going to see, even in this story, is I think later on, and I'm going to show you in the text, I think he tries to get a little more out of this situation.
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But we'll see that in a moment.
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So when we get to verse 34, from verse 34 to verse 49, it's the whole thing over again.
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Because the servant has stood up before dinner, and he says, all right, before dinner, I am going to tell you why I'm here.
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And it's important to note that he includes everything, including his talk with the Lord.
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He does not leave that out.
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If you read verses 34 to 49, you will see he recounts everything, even the prayers to the Lord.
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So that this guy knows, Laban and his family knows, not only have I come here at the behest of Abraham, but I have come here at the leading of the Lord of hosts, Abraham's God.
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And he is the one who, when I was praying that a woman would come, and I would be able to get a drink of water, and she would offer that to my camels, when I was praying for that, I didn't even get the words out of my mouth, and here she comes walking with her water jar, and I knew, that's the one.
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So he tells this story, he recounts it step by step, verse by verse, step by step, and he mentions his worship of the Lord.
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And then we pick up at verse 50, and I want you to pick this up, because this is important.
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At verse 50 it says this, Then Laban and Bethuel answered and said, This thing has come from the Lord.
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We cannot speak to you bad or good.
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Behold, Rebekah is before you.
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Take her and go, and let her be the wife of your master's son, as the Lord has spoken.
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Notice what they're saying, the English here is not really capturing the heart of what the Hebrew says, because when they say, this thing has come from the Lord, we cannot speak to you bad or good, that sounds to us sort of like, sort of him hawing, well, we can't say anything good or bad.
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What the actual idiom underneath the Hebrew phrase means is, this thing is from the Lord, we have nothing to say, because who can answer back to God? Isn't that what the Bible tells us? When the Lord speaks, who can answer back to God? Isn't that what we read in Romans 9? Who are you, O man, to answer back to God? So at least Laban and Bethuel recognize that they cannot deny the hand of Providence in this moment.
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I'm going to tell you a story, and I was sort of on my way in this morning, I was praying whether or not I should even mention this, because I certainly don't want this to be misunderstood, but I'm going to tell you the story, and hopefully it won't misunderstand.
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There was a time when I was in seminary, and I was a youth pastor here.
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This was 17, 16 years ago, something like that, and I got offered a job at another church, and I did not know what the Lord wanted me to do, and I prayed and asked God.
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I said, God, I don't know, because honestly, I went to a Southern Baptist school.
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This church was not Southern Baptist, still isn't, but I thought God was going to take me and make me a Southern Baptist preacher.
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That's what I really thought God had in my line of direction.
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I thought that was, I mean, Southern Baptist College, Southern Baptist, you know, that was the direction.
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I thought God had me to go, and our former pastor, his name was Darrell Olgies.
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Darrell had a very peculiar way that he preached, and those who were here remember he had a very peculiar preaching style, and it was not expositional.
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He would read a verse of the Bible, and then he would tell stories, and I'm not trying to disfame him or anything.
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Everybody who was here remembers, and you all say amen, because you know I'm right, and I was torn up in my heart that the word of God was not being proclaimed here, and that's one of the reasons why when I had the job offer from the other church, I felt like maybe I should go, because I want to go somewhere where I can preach God's word.
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So I went to Darrell, and I said Darrell, I said God has called me to preach.
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I said I know more than anything in the world that is what I'm called to do.
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I said and I do have a job offer from another church, but I also don't feel confident that it's where I'm supposed to be.
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I said but God has called me to preach.
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Would you be willing, and keep understand the context, he was going to retire in a year anyway, so I was not kicking him out of the way, but I did say this, I said Darrell, would you be willing, I don't want any money, I don't care if you pay me or anything, I said but would you be willing to let me preach? And you can be the senior pastor, you can keep the money, I don't care about the money, I said but would you be willing to let me preach? I fully suspected he was going to laugh in my face.
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I suspected that would be my, how he let me know that it was time for me to go.
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And I sat down in Darrell's office, I said I know one thing, God has called me to preach, and he said I agree.
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I said will you let me preach? And he said yep.
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And I said, and I really, I had almost fainted, I said you're willing to let me do all the preaching? And he said absolutely, it's what God called you to do.
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And he said starting in January, this was January 2005, you can do all the preaching.
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And I know that's a weird story to tell, but I tell that story only because of this, at that point what could I say to the Lord except for thy will be done? And that's where Bethuel and Laban are here, they have seen the hand of God working, and what else, and by the way I'm still here, you know 17 years later, because this is where God wanted me, this is where, he wasn't ready for me to go anywhere.
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You look at this story, God is so clear with his providence in bringing all these things about, so the father and the brother of this woman can say we don't have anything to say.
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I went home that day and I told my wife, I said you'll never believe this, Daryl wants me to preach, and it's good.
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Jack you remember it don't you? It's the weirdest thing ever.
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I tell that story to other preachers, they don't believe it.
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It was an amazing moment, because it was God's providence in keeping me here, and I'm still here because of that.
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It's just an amazing thing.
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So like I said, this is just, what they're saying is I just can't, there's just God doing this.
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There's no other way to describe it.
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God brought you these 500 miles.
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God put you right where you're supposed to be.
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He opened your eyes and showed you this woman.
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He has done a miracle here.
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We can't deny it.
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So then we get to verse 52.
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When Abraham's servant heard their words, he bowed himself to the earth before the Lord, and the servant brought out jewelry and gold and garments and gave them to Rebekah.
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And he also gave them to her brother and her mother, costly ornaments.
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And he and the men who were with him ate and drank, and they spent the night there.
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And when they arose in the morning, he said, send me on the way to my master.
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He's ready to go home.
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But, verse 55, her brother and her mother said, let the young woman remain for us a while, at least ten days, and after that she may go.
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By the way, that's another one of those times where the Hebrew doesn't really do, the English doesn't do the Hebrew justice, because what they're actually saying, let us stay here, and I'll read it directly.
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The amount of time is ambiguous.
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The Targums interpreted this phrase to mean a year or ten minutes.
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As if to say, let her stay as long as we want her to stay.
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So the whole idea of it's just ten days, you go to Laban later, and Laban has a way of extending time.
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And so he's making it intentionally ambiguous.
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Let her stay a year or ten minutes.
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Whatever.
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And here's what Spurgeon said.
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Spurgeon about this passage, he said, he thought, perhaps, that there were more golden bracelets to be had, that he was parting with his sister too cheaply, that he must not let the priceless gem go out of his hands too soon.
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You can imagine if that servant would have left, expecting her to come ten days later, he might have received a letter and said, hey, we need a little more, if she's going to come.
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And the servant said, no, no.
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We're not going to do it that way.
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So her brother and mother said, well, let the young woman remain with us.
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Or rather, excuse me, verse 57, they said, let us call the young woman and ask her.
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And they called Rebekah and said to her, will you go out with this man? And she said, I will go.
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So she sent away Rebekah with her sister and her nurse and Abraham's servant and his men.
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And they blessed Rebekah and said to her, our sister, may you become thousands of ten thousands, and may your offspring possess the gates of those who hate him.
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By the way, I think that that particular passage, that particular section, verse 60, is a reminder to the people of Israel to whom this was written, of the promise they were about to receive.
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Because by the way, did Sarah, I'm sorry, did Rebekah have ten thousands? No.
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But her descendants did.
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In fact, all of those ten thousands of ten thousands are reading this as Moses is writing it and reading it to them.
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They're hearing this.
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This message is to them.
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And they are about to go and take their enemies in the promised land.
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And we see that in the book of Joshua.
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So this is written to them specifically as a reminder of the promise.
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Verse 61.
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Then Rebekah and her young women.
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The King James Version says damsels.
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NIV says maids.
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She was probably a woman of high status, so these were basically her entourage.
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And they rode on the camels and followed the men.
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Thus the servant took Rebekah and went his way.
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Now we get to verse 62.
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We're almost done.
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Verse 62.
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Now Isaac had returned from Beerlehiroi and was dwelling in the Negev.
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And Isaac went out to meditate in the field toward the evening.
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Now the word meditate there is kind of ambiguous.
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Some people think it means he was praying.
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Some people think it means he was in deep thought.
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The word meditate in Hebrew is a little odd.
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It doesn't always mean prayer.
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I think he was thinking about his mama.
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You say, well, how did he come to that conclusion? Because later it says he was comforted and lost his mother.
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And you have people who lose a family member sometimes find themselves in deep thought about the person that they've lost.
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So it kind of would fit in the context here.
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But he's out there in the field.
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He's meditating.
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And he lifted up his eyes and he saw and behold there were camels coming.
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And Rebekah lifted up her eyes and when she saw that it was Isaac, she, King James, she lighted upon the camel or dismounted from the camel.
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She jumped down and she said to the servant, Who is the man walking in the field? The servant said, It is my master.
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So she took her veil and covered herself because that was the standard of the day that she would not be seen in her face.
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And the servant told Isaac all the things that had been done.
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And I'm sure he told every part.
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And I'm surprised the text doesn't repeat it.
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Because it did earlier.
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I'm surprised it doesn't do it again.
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Then Isaac brought her into the tent of his mother Rebekah and she became his wife and he loved her.
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That's very opposite of what we have today.
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In the world today, man and woman fall in love and she becomes a wife.
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In this story, she became the wife and then they fell in love.
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It is different, but it is how it was.
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It says, And he loved her.
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So Isaac was comforted after his mother's death.
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Now that ends a chapter.
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Let me just say a few words by way of application and then we'll close.
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This passage puts on display for us the providence of God in fulfilling His covenant promises.
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He promised Abraham land and seed.
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Isaac stays in the land and he has brought a wife so that they may fulfill that promise of a seed.
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And as we will see next week in chapter 25, they will have twins, Jacob and Esau.
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As I said in my introduction, this is the most elaborate narrative in all of Genesis in regarding any wedding.
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In fact, I'm not sure there's any other passage in the Bible about a wedding that's really this long or drawn out as to how everything goes.
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I could be wrong about that.
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And while I would never allegorize the text too far, I do believe there is an analogy here that we should not miss.
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And this is how I want to draw us to a close.
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Scripture tells us very clearly that marriage is an analogy for the Gospel.
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You guys understand that, right? Maybe some of you even had the pastor at your wedding say that.
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That this is a picture of the Gospel.
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The bridegroom is representing Christ and the bride represents His church.
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And in this particular scene, in this particular narrative, we have already seen in previous chapters Isaac is a picture of Christ.
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He's the promised son of the Father whom the Son loves.
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We know this.
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He is a picture of Jesus Christ.
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Isaac is what we would call a type of Christ.
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And in the same way Abraham provided a bride for his son, God has provided a bride for His son.
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In the same way Abraham sent His servant to retrieve the bride, God sends His Holy Spirit to retrieve the elect from all the nations of the world and bring them in by way of regeneration.
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In the same way Rebekah was willing to come to the Son, the elect are willing to come to the Son because they have been given the gift of regeneration to come to Christ.
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And in the same way Isaac received Rebekah and loved her, Christ receives us and loves us as a husband loves his bride, so Christ loves the church.
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If you are a believer, hear this right now, if you're a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, you are a gift from the Father to the Son.
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God sent forth His Holy Spirit to come into this world and retrieve you as a gift.
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He gave you the gift of regeneration and by that gift you came willingly to the bridegroom.
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You came to the Son and you became His bride.
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And think about the response of Rebekah.
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When her parents, or her brother rather, was trying to keep her for an additional season, they said, will you go? And she said, yes I will.
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Yes I will.
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That is the response of every one of God's elect when God's Spirit comes and opens their heart and they hear the call of the Gospel, will you come? Yes I will.
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At the end of the Bible we read, it says the Spirit and the church say, come.
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And if you're a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit gave you that ability to say, yes I will.
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I will come and I will be made a bride for the Son.
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That's the beauty of this.
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This picture of love between a man and a wife is a picture of the greater love that God had when He sent forth His Son to take a bride.
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And we are that bride.
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Let's pray.
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Father, I thank You for Your Word.
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I thank You for Your Son Jesus Christ.
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And I pray Lord that we would understand that He is in fact the bridegroom and we are the bride.
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Those who have believed in Him have been bought with a price.
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And it wasn't ten camels filled with gold and silver and jewels and clothing, but it was a bloody cross on a hill called Golgotha when our bridegroom went and died for us and took upon himself the sins that we have committed.
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You made him who knew no sin to become sin for us that we could become the righteousness of God in Him.
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And now You have called us to be His bride and all of You are elect to say, yes I will.
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I will come.
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Lord, I pray that if there are those in this room today who do not know You, but Lord from the foundation of the world they have been numbered among Your elect, Lord that You would draw them to Yourself today that they would say, yes I will at the call of the Gospel that says come.
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Come.
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Come behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.
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Come.
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Lord, let us come willingly by the power of Your Spirit who makes us willing.
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And I pray Lord for all who do know You that we would be able to celebrate and enjoy the love that is given to us through our Savior and our Bridegroom Jesus Christ in whose name we pray.
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Amen.