Living In A Foreign Land (Genesis 26:1-17)
Rev. William L. Barron, January 13, 2019Part of the Morning Worship at North Greenville Church series, preached at a Sunday Morning service
As at the time of Abraham, a famine strikes Isaac. Isaac decides to go to Egypt and stops in Gerar. God speaks directly to Isaac for the first recorded time. God tells him to stay here, not to go to Egypt. You and your offspring will receive blessings. While Isaac was in Gerar, he sowed and was blessed, as were his Philistine neighbors and King Abimelech. There are two types of Philistines. The ones in Genesis were kind to the Israelites. The ones in Judges and later were a problem. A second temptation comes in addition to the famine and the lure of Egypt, concerning the beauty of his young wife Rebekah. Isaac lies that Rebekah is his sister, not his wife, for fear of his life. Abraham in the same situation did the same, but Sarah was both wife and sister. Isaac lied to save his own neck and sacrificed Rebekah’s honor. Isaac doubted God’s promise. This is ironic in that Isaac was the apparent sacrifice on Mt. Moriah, but God provided His own sacrifice out of love, a picture of God’s love in Christ. Will we trust God through persecution? If we won’t trust, we lack faith. Abimelech saw the couple doing things that brothers and sisters would not do. Isaac’s lie found him out. Abimelech confronts Isaac with a morality challenge. Abimelech warns the people not to touch either of them. Isaac became very wealthy. The Philistines envied him, and they filled up Isaac’s wells. Abimelech decides they must part ways. Isaac moves to the Valley of Gerar; he stays in the land and is faithful to God. God faithfully delivers on His promise. We celebrate the Lord’s Supper because we have a faithful God, all the way back to Adam and Eve.
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Genesis 26:1–17 (Listen)
26:1 Now there was a famine in the land, besides the former famine that was in the days of Abraham. And Isaac went to Gerar to Abimelech king of the Philistines. 2 And the LORD appeared to him and said, “Do not go down to Egypt; dwell in the land of which I shall tell you. 3 Sojourn in this land, and I will be with you and will bless you, for to you and to your offspring I will give all these lands, and I will establish the oath that I swore to Abraham your father. 4 I will multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven and will give to your offspring all these lands. And in your offspring all the nations of the earth shall be blessed, 5 because Abraham obeyed my voice and kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws.”
6 So Isaac settled in Gerar. 7 When the men of the place asked him about his wife, he said, “She is my sister,” for he feared to say, “My wife,” thinking, “lest the men of the place should kill me because of Rebekah,” because she was attractive in appearance. 8 When he had been there a long time, Abimelech king of the Philistines looked out of a window and saw Isaac laughing with Rebekah his wife. 9 So Abimelech called Isaac and said, “Behold, she is your wife. How then could you say, ‘She is my sister’?” Isaac said to him, “Because I thought, ‘Lest I die because of her.’” 10 Abimelech said, “What is this you have done to us? One of the people might easily have lain with your wife, and you would have brought guilt upon us.” 11 So Abimelech warned all the people, saying, “Whoever touches this man or his wife shall surely be put to death.”
12 And Isaac sowed in that land and reaped in the same year a hundredfold. The LORD blessed him, 13 and the man became rich, and gained more and more until he became very wealthy. 14 He had possessions of flocks and herds and many servants, so that the Philistines envied him. 15 (Now the Philistines had stopped and filled with earth all the wells that his father’s servants had dug in the days of Abraham his father.) 16 And Abimelech said to Isaac, “Go away from us, for you are much mightier than we.”
17 So Isaac departed from there and encamped in the Valley of Gerar and settled there.
(ESV)