Grace in Gerar

Sanctification Through Beholding the Lord

Well this morning we look to complete chapter 20. It's been a while since we've done a chapter in a go. But we started out Genesis with that as our prerogative. We want to try to keep an eye on the bigger storyline of what God is doing.

What's being unfolded not only about the Lord and his character, but also the Lord's redemptive plan and purpose in.

History.

Last week we considered lots legacy. We remember the distant smell of salt and brimstone that would have wafted toward the tents of Abraham Reminding him that though God was indeed a friend to Abraham. He was also a consuming fire and.

A holy judge.

And as Abraham continues to know more and more About the character of the Lord this knowledge this understanding of the Lord continues to shape. Abraham begins to shape and mold Abraham's own character.

This is what we call sanctification in the Christian life. The more we behold the Lord the more we look unto Jesus. The more we lay hold of the means of grace and understand more about who he is and what he's done the more We are made to be like him.

Yet as we'll see this morning That does not always go smoothly consistently. Does not always go from strength to strength. It is not without its stumbling and its failure. We said last week as believers.

We should never become so comfortable with failure. That we lose sight of God's holy wrath. That we tremble under the hand of God that we take to heart his warnings. And we are we guard against being presumptive about our safety.

Remember we don't identify ourselves as lot scarcely saved as we said we identify ourselves with lots wife. Always prone to look back. We remember Paul's great warning. God is not mocked. And I realized perhaps last week was a was a heavy sermon maybe the past two weeks as we considered God's wrath poured out upon the cities of the plain and.

And one of the things that we love about expository preaching of course is that you you're forced to grapple with the text you're forced to engage the text as the whole counsel of God and That means all the warps and whoops.

That means when it's in season and when it's out of season and. So beautifully we have this great contrast emerging where we've seen God's judgment so heavily in chapter 19. We turn to chapter 20 and in many ways we see God's profound grace.

Covenant Judgment and Grace in Genesis 20

And so we see these themes they're yoked together throughout scripture. The ferocity of God's judgment and the extravagance of God's grace. And so as believers as we said last week at the same time we should never be so fearful meaning terrified.

That we lose sight of God's long-suffering love. His designs patient designs. To renew his mercy to his people every morning without fail. Because he cannot deny himself. And so perfect love casts out fear.

What we're going to see this morning is God's covenantal commitment. Genesis 1929 we got a preview of this and it's going to help us understand Genesis 20. It came to pass when God destroyed the cities of the plain that God Remembered Abraham and sent lot out of the midst of the overthrow and so we said that's a covenantal remembering.

It's not that God had somehow forgotten Abraham and then he said, oh, what am I doing? I forgot I had to save lot. I just remembered Abraham. No, this is a way of saying God looks to his covenant. God stood upon the covenant He had established with Abraham and out of that covenantal commitment.

He delivered lot. Now the same dynamic is at play when God delivers Abraham and Sarah this morning in chapter 20. We see that beginning in verse 1 with Abraham's sin. We read Abraham journeyed from there to the south that would be the Negev a literal region called the south in Hebrew I think better translated a be Abraham journey to the Negev.

That's how Moses audience would have understood it and dwelt between between Kadesh and shore and stayed in Gerar. We don't know we don't have recorded what exactly prompted Abraham to move out from the the great terebinth trees of Mamre.

Perhaps he had witnessed the destruction of Sodom and his heart was so heavy. He couldn't bear to see this scene of Destruction knowing what had happened to so many of his relatives through lot and he decided it was time to leave.

That that could be it may be that as Abraham is now heading south heading to a city. It's the same time that lot is leaving the city of Zoar and heading into the mountains. There's a whole dynamic as we've seen of the wilderness as opposed to the city Throughout Genesis.

There's this great theme. It the city is almost always a sign of trouble and that's setting up a biblical Storyline of the coming of the city of God. Remember Abraham is the one who's looking for the maker and builder of that city yet to come.

But here he's heading like lot into a city that I think seems to provide for him. The city called Gerar was in the western part of the Negev. Negev is south. It's another way of talking about an arid land or a dry land.

It's a desert land so to speak but there are fertile plains like a patchwork in certain sections of it and that's where Gerar a royal city near the settlement of what would later become the Philistines and So it's it's toward the Mediterranean.

It's a fertile plain and we forget that Abraham is a sojourner. He's given to us and presented to us as a wanderer as a pilgrim. And so unlike Lot he did not establish a Home between the Terebinth trees so much as he pitched his tent there for a really long time.

But remember he's a he's a very wealthy man. He has This was decades ago 318 servants 318 male servants able to fight and that was back then. How many more servants does he have now and how much more cattle does he have now?

He's a very wealthy man with a very large retinue and When the rain rainy season is is dried up and he has these herds that need to be led to pasture. It's it's time to move on. He lives in a tent. He lives like a Bedouin.

So his name Sarna speculates it may be that a lack of rain Prompted him to move south to find a place that he could bring his animals to pasture. Now keep in mind where we're heading into Genesis 12 memories here.

There was a famine in the land and that prompted him to head down to Egypt to find safety and security in Egypt and it seems to be the same dynamic here if we can speculate and I think this is Good speculation if we can speculate.

That he felt it was time for the sake of his flocks and his possessions to find a better place to provide for them. Then we should realize this transition is going to also bring with it testing. These kinds of transitions these kinds of circumstances in the Christian life.

Allow God the opportunity to test our faith. So he deprives us of something. He takes away something. He brings us to a new circumstance or a new challenge and our red flags go up. God is going to be testing me.

God wants to show wants to show me his work in my life. Have I been here before? How am I going to handle it this time after so much more of his grace being wrought into my life? Hopefully Abraham would be able to see that.

Oh, I remember last time we we had a big move because the going was tough and we needed some provisions. That didn't turn out very well. I better be on guard. I better really make sure my heart is solid before the Lord.

I better avail myself of good counsel and means of grace. I don't want to stumble and fall and so that's that's instructive for us as Christians, isn't it when we get to these places in our lives where a Circumstance comes our way or when we make a transition we expect that God is going to test us.

Abraham’s Lie and the Fear of Man

And Abraham between verse 1 and verse 2. It almost reads nonchalantly. Completely utterly fails this test. Now Abraham said of Sarah his wife. She is my sister and Abimelech king of Gorar sent out and took Sarah.

So just like Egypt the same dynamic here. When Abraham moved into Gorar he immediately lied about Sarah. He said she is my sister and as we'll see later on. This is a scheme that he had worked out. This was his old alibi his old excuse.

This was just what he said to people who inquired about Sarah if those people happen to have armor and Swords and a lot of power in a land that was foreign. And so once again, we have this dynamic a pagan ruler in this case.

Not Pharaoh, but Abimelech took Sarah into his royal harem. Now as readers of Genesis we go. That's an interesting marriage. What's conspicuously absent here in Genesis 20 is what was there in Genesis 13?

Sarah was so profoundly beautiful. She was irresistible and all the men of Egypt were groveling after her and of course Pharaoh Being the the top dog in Egypt was able to secure her into his royal harem.

But we've been reading Genesis. She's well past the age of childbearing. That's not a very good prospect for a royal harem. The whole point of gathering many wives is you want as many offspring as possible?

Well, she's self-evidently past the point of childbearing and We don't read that her beauty was so desirable that the men of Gorar were groveling after her. So why? Does this king of Gorar take Sarah into his royal harem?

Well, some ancient rabbis said that part of the promise that was given right at the tent. No, Sarah, you did laugh this time next year I will come and you shall have a son. That part of that promise was a rejuvenation a miraculous rejuvenation of her physical body.

So that she could not only sustain the pregnancy but nourish the child afterward. And so the ancient rabbis saw this as maybe Evidence they speculated it could be that she was so rejuvenated to her former beauty in preparation for God's fulfillment of his promise.

That's possible. But scripture does not say that. I think it's far more likely. That a beemalek does what many other rulers would have done not just at this period in ancient history. But even well through some of the great ancient empires even through the Roman Empire you secure your own power and your own stability by Marrying or intermarrying with foreign foreigners, especially wealthy powerful foreigners.

And remember Abraham appears very wealthy and very powerful. Perhaps there was some renowned about this man who delivered the Sodomites from the hand of Keter Laomer. This is a powerful man and God goes before him.

And so perhaps there is something of this display of I need to secure an alliance with him. And therefore I will marry his sister. I will take his sister his elderly sister into my harem so that we have this compact.

Remember that in the next chapter there's actually going to be a covenant that Abraham cuts with a beemalek and so already we see these dynamics of power and Establishing a relationship and marriage was used in the ancient world among rulers and elites to establish this kind of solidity.

I think that's far more likely. So he was happy to take Sarah and his understanding Abraham's sister that he would have an alliance a certain Security, you wouldn't have to worry about Abraham being up to no good.

He wouldn't have to worry about there being some instability or Abraham joining forces to undermine him. And so that's what how marriage was used. We see this in Genesis later on. We'll see this with Solomon.

Most likely this is why Solomon marries Pharaoh's daughter to secure some sort of alliance. This is why Roman Emperors often married and divorced women much older. It's why Cleopatra so famously married multiple men across many decades.

It wasn't the former beauty so much as the power the stability that could be offered through marriage. Abraham said of Sarah his wife. She is my sister.

He lied.

Lying was the sin that Abraham typically succumbs to When he was in this situation filled with the dread of what might happen to him otherwise and so this is a deceit that's fueled by the fear of man and This fear of man is for Abraham an utter lack of faith.

He has just seen the Lord By the tent had a feast with him. Heard the promise within the year your wife will have the son of promise and Look at faithless Abraham now say you're my sister and now she gets taken away into the harem again a complete and utter disaster.

Though the promise is less than a year off this is coming off the heels of a promise that within a year would have flooded Abraham's life with the Miraculous power of God the fulfillment of all of the promises that began initially when he called him out of her of the Caldeans.

But out of this fear of man, he willfully Endangers the arrival even the fulfillment of this promise. It's as if he bargains it away. I'm so worried about my own neck I've forgotten the promise of God.

In fact, I'm willing to completely jeopardize that promise. So more than just the promise from the picnic the picnic promise.

God also said.

Abraham I'm going to bless those who bless you. I'm going to curse those who curse you. He also forgot that He could have walked in there like Untouchable. I remember seeing this video of Vladimir Putin.

Remember Vladimir Putin, of course was a former KGB officer. I can imagine the kind of training he had. He probably was not a pencil pusher and he he was on some Recording for television was a live television recording.

Of course. He's got bodyguards everywhere and This group of protesters rush at him and they literally get within two he turns around and they're rushing at him. They look like they're about to tackle him and he does not even flinch he literally just turns them and kind of just stares at them coldly while his Security completely devours them and like tackles them to the ground and they get hauled off probably never to be seen again.

That could have been how Abraham walked around Gerrard. Completely unfazed untouchable. Do what you want. If you bless me my God the maker of heavens and earth. He will bless you you curse me. It's not gonna go well for you.

God is my shield. God's my very great reward. What shall man do to me? Therefore I will not fear. That's how he could have walked around Gerrard, but he lost his faith in God's promise He lost sight of God's presence and now he began to panic.

He really felt that now man could do much to him and that God was not going to secure him not be his shield not Protect him though. God had already delivered him from the hands of Keter Leoma in his armies.

He's completely thinking I have to fend for myself. And the only way I can do that is by lying. So Sarah, please do what we've always done say you're my sister. Abraham in other words tries to be his own shield.

Now we can sympathize with that because that's very common for us to do isn't it we try to be our own shield. We fend for ourselves when it seems like there's no way God's Word can come to pass.

It's too difficult.

It's too hard. The circumstances are too extreme. God himself could sympathize with my plight with my position. Surely surely I'm the gray area of his word applying here. Surely I'm the exception that proves the rule.

Surely anyone would understand given where I am in my life and where we've been and what we've been through and what my health is. Like surely God would understand why we cannot do this. We try to become our own shield we try to be our own provision and so one example of this.

Someone's rather lonely rather isolated. I Had I had a very close friend very very close friend and a brother someone who would rebuke and exhort. Someone who would often point things out in my life and encourage me to repent.

I remember taking a week to go up and do some street evangelism and in New Hampshire and Vermont and Maine with him and It was just glorious. We'd pray every night and throughout the day. We would have times of devotions together.

We've got on the street pass out tracks sit on the benches try to talk to these crusty New Englanders about the Lord. But he was a very lonely man very lonely and I could see in his heart this wrestling.

Okay, Lord, I've given you my life now. I've turned from my former ways Lord. Don't you owe me a relationship now? Don't you owe me the desire of my heart a wife? Want to have a marriage Lord and and He became clouded in his judgment where he was so desperate for a relationship that he began to doubt God actually would give him this desire that God would lead him and be faithful to him.

And so he began to turn a blind eye and he began to build a relationship with someone who really was not Equally yoked to him. It's really not someone who loved the Lord had a pretense to it. But it was clear to anyone within three feet after five minutes.

This was not a Christian God. I I'm I'm so alone and I'm so despairing. This is the only chance I have I Know what your word says. I know what my friends are counseling me. I know what pastors. No, no, no God will work this out.

It'll be okay. She'll come around. At at root is Lord. I don't trust you. I don't believe your word. I don't believe you'll provide for me. I don't believe you're enough for me Lord, I can't be faithful here.

I have to provide for myself and then maybe you can work that out. And so he ran off. He's no longer walking with the Lord today last time I saw him asked if we could meet. He gave me a fake phone number.

We say.

Lord.

You don't care about me. You wouldn't allow this to be in my life right now. You've given me promises. You said there'd be a way out. You said you'd be an ever-present help in a time of need Lord. You promised to deliver me and to help me Lord.

You seem to be moving and now you seem so distant Lord. You don't care about me. And so like Pharaoh we harden our hearts against God. We begin to doubt his goodness or.

Lord.

All I've ever done is try to follow you and now look at my look at my life. Look at my reputation. Look at what people say about me. Look how people view me Lord and you're not doing anything about it.

And so I'm gonna vindicate myself. I I won't be patient. I'm gonna be bitter. I'm gonna lash out because I'm tired of waiting on you in humility becoming a Rad for everyone else to stomp on Lord. We we do this.

We try to become our own shield. We try to fend for ourselves provide for ourselves. Abraham has been walking with the Lord for 25 years. He's had triumphs of faith when God said go circumcise all of your household all that dwell within your tent.

He wasn't like oh, it's kind of a highly, you know, can we negotiate this a little bit? He just did it. That's faith. That's that might be one of the most shocking examples of faith in all Genesis as far as I'm concerned.

Adult circumcision.

In.

Genesis 18 when those Angels visited him. He was so generous. He rushed around to prepare this great feast and and then when God said shall I hide from Abraham what I'm about to do? And he told him of the destruction that was going to be poured out upon the cities.

Abraham stepped in his way. No Lord. He began to intercede and so we see this great triumph of Abraham's faith. He's been a model of faith as soon as he was called out of or of the Caldeans dwelling in a tent.

Not not allowing his heart to be like lots heart pandering after the things of the world. But here is this triumphal failure. He completely lacks faith and the New Testament says he's the father of our faith.

He's the father of all we who believe and you realize boy that's true in more ways than one, isn't it? He really is the father of our faith. Because our faith is prone to wander our faith does stumble and fail and falter.

There's many ways and times in our lives where we we fend for ourselves and we try to become our own shield and As Greg alluded to we we don't think that God's the watchman for us. We think it's up to us.

And so we're gonna make it happen. Even it's even if it's a little dodgy on what God shows in his word. He's like me. He's prone to wander Lord. We feel it. Abraham's a lot like me. Look at Abraham here.

Are you dealing with old sins. Abraham should have known once this trying time came and it was time to move, you know, Sarah, let's get on our knees. We know what God has promised and we're about to head south and last time we traveled things didn't go so well.

Let's get on our knees. Let's fast before we go. Let's let's drown ourselves in prayer. Let's ask for a lot of people to pray for us. We know this is going to be a real time of testing. Are you dealing with old sins?

Are you aware of old patterns? Recurring sins as we see here. They have this they have this effect not just on our relationship with God, but on all of our other relationships. Think of what these kinds of times did to Sarah's feelings for Abraham how that war like a burden on their marriage this great man of faith.

Willingly sending her into a harem to be used as property from some tyrant. Think about the destructive Seeds that he brought into his marriage because of this recurring sin, you know later on in Genesis when we get to Genesis 26 We're gonna see he passes this sin on to Isaac.

Isaac will do the same thing sin. It's it's never just about us in our individual relationship with God. It always has collateral damage. And so Abraham's sin is now affecting Sarah and it's affecting his whole household.

It's affecting a be Malek and that whole nation. It's affecting that whole people group. It's affecting his progeny. It's affecting the accomplishment of God's promise all of that because of this pattern of sin that Abraham has not dealt with.

Are you dealing with your patterns of sin? Are you dealing with habitual sins in your life? What we sometimes refer to as the Fox's in the vineyard. They they trip us up. They so easily as Hebrews says entangle us.

Sometimes they're very hard to identify. Because we use the language and the concepts of the world to try to identify them. We attribute to our personality our upbringing that which God says is sinful and it may well be our personality.

But it's a sinful trait within our personality and therefore we need to repent of it. We need the Lord's grace to purge it. Oh I've always had a temper. I've always been a hothead. I grew up in a house, you know I should have seen my father my mother if they could really get into it.

And so, you know, this is just kind of what I grew up with. This is what I'm like. That's nice, but you're a Christian now. That can't fly anymore. That needs to be repented of you need to see that recurring pattern and all of its destructive power.

Oh Well, you know. We've always we've always been a very Prideful family, I suppose we've always really put all of our emphasis on our great achievements and our great goods and our worldly ambitions.

That's okay. If that was part of your lifestyle then it cannot be a part of your lifestyle now. You're a Christian. Are you dealing with sin? Are you identifying and rooting out sin? What easily entangles you when you identify it according to God's Word you begin to pursue the Lord toward it Lord.

Help me to see this help me not to excuse it not to allow the Circumstances to be something to hide behind help me to take action Lord. Let me see your power at work in my life Lord you also realize that when you think you've conquered an old sin an old habit something that was recurring and then you've experienced that deliverance as Paul says in 1st Corinthians 10 12.

Don't think you stand.

I.

Don't think you stand. You're always just one step away from falling right back into a pattern that you thought was dead. And you thought was dormant. And usually when you fall back into it, it's far worse.

Far worse.

The chains are that much stronger The enemy is not as willing to let you out The guilt is so much stronger. Therefore the the deadening effects of sin and conscience all of that is at play.

So don't think you're standing lest you fall. I.

Know there's Christians in this room that there's certain recurring things that were part of their former life or even maybe their early life in Christ and they finally repented and the Lord gave them deliverance and I haven't even thought about that in 20 years.

When you hear yourself saying something like that, I would never I haven't thought about that in 20 years. 1st Corinthians 10 12. But I could do it tomorrow. Could fall right back into that, you know, here go I by the grace of God Abraham had been faithful to God in all of these spectacular ways.

He had shown great faith, but he's still so vulnerable if the circumstance is just right. And that's very instructive to us. We can be on the mountaintops of faith. We can think now that I've seen this I'll never stumble.

I'll never doubt. I'll never struggle again.

Beware.

Abraham's last vision of where he had pitched his tent was the cities that God had destroyed. You would think that would have instilled Something of the fear of God that would have prevented him from stumbling like this in Genesis 20, but it doesn't.

But it doesn't. And and you and I know what that's like. We might not have physically seen something on the scale of Sodom and Gomorrah. But surely if we're Christians there's been times where we have trembled at the Word of God trembled at it where we felt like we could lie down.

Like the reports of Under Edwards preaching and Enfield when he preached sinners in the hands of an angry God, maybe you've had something of that experience. Was that experience that profound encounter with the reality of God's holiness and his judgment upon sin?

Was that enough to turn you back from sin even just later that week? So don't be too hard on Abraham see yourself in Abraham, but notice secondly, even though Abraham's faith is faltering God's faithfulness is not.

God's Rebuke of Abimelech and His Covenant Protection

Even though Abraham's faith is faltering God's faithfulness is not Genesis 20. Verse 3. God came to Abimelech in a dream by night and said to him Indeed you are a dead man. Because of the woman whom you've taken.

She is a man's wife. So God here in verse 3 intervenes on Abraham's behalf. I kind of titled this God's rebuke and you're expecting God's rebuke to come to who?

Abraham.

You know Abraham lied saying this is my sister and now God's gonna rebuke. Okay, let him have it Lord. I can't believe he messed up like this. All right, Lord, let him have it. All right, Abimelech. You're a dead man wrong guy Lord.

He was the one that was lied to you should be rebuking Abraham. He's the liar Abimelech sort of the victim here. He doesn't know it's not right for him to take it. It's not right for him to have this plurality of wives, but Lord, you know, if anyone's gonna be rebuked it surely it's going to be.

Abraham.

But God is intervening on Abraham's behalf. God in his grace is Preventing the consequences of Abraham's sin. And that reminds us that God's grace is often intervening on our behalf Preventing us from the consequences of our own sin.

I'm sure if you give some time to consider it. All of you here who walk with the Lord can have a testimony of how the Lord in his grace Delivered you from the consequences of your sins.

That.

Though there should have been some effect in your marriage because of your life in your children because of your life. Certain consequences to your health because of your life. That God and his mercy spared you of the consequences of your sin.

God and his grace intervenes on our behalf because of his covenantal love. And so even the problems that we create even the messes that we make so often God restrains us from the full consequences of it and where he brings a consequence into our lives.

He even allows that to be part of his loving chastisement part of his faithful correction. He does not turn the consequences of his people's sins upon their head as judgment for the judgment of their sin as to the guilt of it was dealt with on the cross of Jesus and Therefore the consequences are restrained unless the consequences are meant to train correct or rebuke.

This is extravagant grace it's as shocking to us as It is here that a beemalek is the one getting rebuked. Notice that God comes to a beemalek in a dream. There's a few instances in the Old Testament where God does Come in dreams to his people, but those are relatively rare.

More often than not God comes to dreams and those who are not his people Non-israelites he comes to Pharaoh. He comes to Nebuchadnezzar. He comes to hear a beemalek. A Modern day counterpart to this interestingly enough is that God seems to do this often to Muslims.

Especially Muslims living in parts of the world where there's no access to the gospel. No access to to Christian revelation whatsoever where maybe there's believers in Iran for instance or in Saudi Arabia and You'd be executed if you ever made any efforts to evangelize people with the Christian faith.

And it seems that there's Muslims that are brought to faith in the Lord. Initially by some dream some revelation. I know of at least three testimonies to this and what strikes me about those testimonies is.

They never depend upon the dream as a basis for their assurance. They say they're very private about it and very secretive about it. They don't want to come out as oh, I had this great dream. It's usually a very traumatic experience for them.

And if you get them to admit it It was a dream that led them to this openness to. I need to know who Jesus is and then they find the word. They find someone who can share with them something about Jesus and from there on they become devoted followers of him.

We have a modern-day counterpart to this that God often does not work in dreams in the lives of his people who have access to his word and his presence, but He will often do it to reach those who do not.

God warns Abimelech in the strongest terms. You are a dead man. That that's a completed action in the Hebrew verb. It's a complete you're dead.

You're dead.

Doesn't say you will be. I'm warning you you better not go through. He says you're a dead man. You are dead. That's how strong the threat is. You're a dead man. This isn't this isn't someone for you to take.

This is a man's wife. You're you're a dead man. Now think of the terror of that. The terror of that you are a dead man, and it leads Abimelech to cry out in protest verse four and five. Lord will you slay a righteous nation also?

Did he not say to me? She is my sister and she Even she herself said he's my brother. Yeah, I was lied to I'm the victim here in the integrity of my heart. And the innocence of my hands. I've done this so that's his plea.

That's his testimony Lord. I was lied to by him and by her. I didn't do this. I didn't steal in the integrity of my hands in the innocence of my heart. I have done this essentially. He's making the same plea that Abraham made in Genesis 18.

Do you remember when God said that he was going to destroy the cities on the plain? Do you remember what Abraham said Lord? Would you slay a righteous people? Lord, would you slay a righteous nation and The answer to that began this negotiation.

No if there's even ten righteous I will spare it notice that Abimelech is acting a lot like Abraham here Lord. Would you slay a righteous nation in other words that the question is how am I the one that has to face the guilt of this?

Lord, will you slay a righteous nation? And then he puts it on them. Did she not say did he not say? So he's protesting about his blamelessness his integrity his innocence. Now, we realize as good Calvinists.

He has nothing of this. He has no blamelessness. He has no innocence. He has no integrity in the ultimate sense of things. But he's using it in a more narrow way as to this. I have integrity as to this.

I've acted innocently we find the psalmist using the same narrow concept where they protest their righteousness or their innocence in Terms of what they're suffering. So Abimelech is not saying he's perfectly righteous.

He's not saying he's perfectly blameless. He just says as to this I acted in integrity. They lied to me. I'm the victim notice verse 6.

Yes.

God says.

Yes, I.

Know you did this in the integrity of your heart. You see God affirms that as to this you acted in integrity. Yes, I know that you did this. For that's an explanatory for I also withheld you from sinning against me.

Therefore I did not let you touch her. And so now we have even more revelation given to Abimelech. It's not that he's this stand-up guy and with integrity he did not compel himself upon Sarah. It was rather the sovereign power of God Restraining him from the sin that he would otherwise do.