In Genesis chapter 25, we find Abraham had remarried and had six more sons. He died when he was 175 years old and left all that he had to Isaac after ensuring that all his other children had been given gifts. Ishmael and Isaac buried their father in the cave with Sarah. Ishmael had 12 sons, two of which became nations that are mentioned later on in the Bible. He lived to be 137 years old.
Isaac prayed and pleaded with God to have a child as Rebekah was barren, similar to his own mother. After 20 years of marriage, Rebekah became pregnant. It was a rough pregnancy though, so she went to pray to God to see what was going on. The Lord told her that she had two nations in her womb that were struggling for power and that the older child would serve the younger one.
She soon gave birth to twin boys. The older one was a hairy child named Esau (based off of his red skin color), and the younger was named Jacob (or usurper because he was holding his brother’s heel when he came out). As they grew up, Isaac preferred his son Esau the hunter and Rebekah preferred her quieter son Jacob. Meaning that the parents had favorites.
One day, Jacob was making stew and Esau came in really tired and hungry. Esau asked for some stew and Jacob said he would sell it to Esau for his birthright – that is the blessings and honor that come from their father due to being the first born son. Esau said that he was so hungry that he was going to die, so he did not care about his birthright and sold it to Jacob. Jacob fed Esau, who ate and went on his way despising his birthright. He did not care if he sold it or not.
This passage reveals the nature of the two sons. One completely focused on the physical, how he felt and what he ate. The other focused on his position and blessings, things that would come from having the birthright. Sometimes we too can get caught up in the physical wants of our bodies that we forget about the position and blessings we have been given.
Be encouraged though that God cares about both. Do not forsake one for the other, but seek God when and where you find places of need and He will provide for you. He will give you all that you need and will not require you to sell Him anything in return because He is a God who loves people and gives freely.
In Genesis 24, we find Abraham getting much older in age and being blessed by the Lord in all that he did. So he calls for a servant to come over and makes the servant promise to God that he will find a wife for his son Isaac from their home country and not from the land that they were staying in. In addition to that, the servant needed to bring the wife back to Isaac, because he could not go into the land of the old country.
The servant made the promise, then took ten camels and went on a journey to the place where Abraham had come from. When the servant arrived in that land in the evening, he had the camels kneel by a well and he prayed that the Lord would reveal Isaac’s wife to the servant. He prayed that the young woman who was to marry him would offer the servant some water from the well and offer to water his camels as well.
Before the servant even finished his prayer, Rebekah came by and did just that. The servant saw that she was beautiful and that she was unwed, but he remained quiet as he sought confirmation from God to make sure that this was indeed Isaac’s wife.
Once he knew for sure, the servant gave Rebekah some gold bracelets and a nose ring and asked Rebekah who her family was and if he could stay with them. Rebekah took the servant to meet her family and let him know that they had lodging for his camels too. Her family invited the servant into the house to eat and tell of his journey. After he finished telling them his story, Rebekah’s father and brother told the servant that she could go with him to be Isaac’s wife. The servant worshipped God for his prayers had been answered.
The servant stayed with them that night, then got up early in the morning ready to go. Rebekah’s brother tried to delay the servant saying that Rebekah would go with him in 10 days, not immediately. The servant was not having it with the foolishness, so they called Rebekah out to ask her what she thought. She said that she would go with the servant that day, so she left that day with her maids.
Isaac was out meditating in a field near his home when he saw the camels coming towards him. He got up and went to meet them. The servant told Isaac of all that had happened, then Isaac took Rebekah as his wife and he loved her. He found comfort in his wife after his mother’s death.
What I find encouraging here is God’s faithfulness to answer prayers. The servant had a task to do and instead of just doing it on his own with his own way of thinking, he turned to the Lord in prayer. He knew that God’s ways were better than his. And you know what? God brought an answer to him before his prayer was even done.
God loves to hear from His children in prayer and loves to answer those prayers. Sometimes it is a quick answer like for the servant, and sometimes it takes years and years for the answer to appear like with God’s promise to give Sarah and Abraham a son. Be encouraged in prayer knowing that God will answer you. Weather quickly or slowly, just trust that God loves you and the answer is on the way.
In Genesis 23, we learn that Sarah, Abraham’s wife, has died at the age of 127. She lived a good long life and got to see her son, that she birthed at 90, grow up to be a man. She saw the promises of God fulfilled, even when it seemed impossible. Even though she didn’t live a perfect life, she lived a good life following after the Lord.
Abraham went to his neighbors and asked them if he could buy some land to bury his dead. Remember that he was a foreigner in that place as God had called him much earlier (before Isaac, before Sodom and Gomorrah) to leave his homeland and move away from his family. The neighbors all thought favorably of Abraham, noting his good reputation, and offered the best of their land to him for free.
Abraham was honored but offered to pay for a field and a cave to bury Sarah. He wanted to guarantee the legal rights to the land, understanding that while it was in the land God had promised him and his descendants in Cannan, God had not given him the land yet. Ephron, one of the neighbors, spoke up publicly and insisted that Abraham take the land for free. After some back and forth, Abraham finally got Ephron to accept a price for the land and cave, giving Abraham and his descendants the legal deed to the land.
While Abraham was mourning Sarah and dealing with all that goes into burying a loved one, the hope of God’s promise was not lost on him. Abraham still held on to the promises of God for his life and the lives of his lineage and acted rightly as he mourned.
Hope can still live even in the midst of great loss. God’s promises are not limited to a specific person or thing, for our hope is in Him and His Word. So be encouraged, even when you face loss. God is still there moving you into position to be ready to take up your promises when the time is right.
In Chapter 22 of Genesis, God wanted to see where Abraham’s heart was, so He asked Abraham to take the thing that he loved most, his promised son, and offer him as a burnt offering. Now this had to have seemed crazy because the Lord did not call for human sacrifice as some other foreign nations had practiced. That was not part of His plan, it was not how he operated or asked for sacrifices to be, so it must have seemed odd that God would all of a sudden ask for this. And to ask for it for the son that He had promised Abraham. To ask Abraham to sacrifice the very thing he had been waiting YEARS, if not a lifetime to get, must have been a hard thing to grasp. Even though it did not make sense, Abraham knew the Lord’s voice, he had seen God come through and keep His promises, and Abraham had seen what happens to nations that were disobedient and pursued evil acts (we’re looking at you Sodom and Gomorrah!), so Abraham packed up what was needed and took his son Isaac up towards the mountain to make a burnt offering to the Lord.
After three days of traveling, Isaac spoke up and basically said “Hey dad… are we missing something? I see the things to make a fire and an alter, but where is the offering? How is this thing going to work?” Isaac must have been used to burnt offerings and alters as they were probably a normal part of his family’s life, so he knew there should have been a lamb with them for this sacrifice, but a lamb he did not see and that must have been peculiar. Abraham told his son not to worry because God would provide an offering. I cannot begin to imagine what was going through either of their minds as they traveled together on this journey.
Once they had gotten to the spot that the Lord had told them to go, Abraham built an alter and laid his son down on it, ready to make the sacrifice. Before anything happened, an Angel of the Lord spoke from heaven to say “STOP!”. The angel told Abraham that he had been faithful, that he feared the Lord and was obedient. Then Abraham saw that there was a ram in the bush right by them to use as an offering and Abraham knew that the Lord had provided.
Then the Angel called to Abraham again and said that he was blessed and that God would multiply his descendants like the stars in the sky and that his lineage would possess the cities of his enemies. All of this was because Abrahma was obedient even when it did not make sense.
God gives us many things in life: gifts, blessings, skills, talents, jobs, friend, family, resources, etc. How would we respond if He told us to sacrifice those things? To give them up freely, with no promise of a return? God is the one who gave them to us in the first place, and as Abraham tells us, He is a God of provision. He is also the God of all creation, He literally made everything that exists – including you and me. Would He not call us to do something if it was not good for us?
Be encouraged, God loves you! And if He asked you to do something that seems impossible, that does not make sense, that might even be a little scary (or A LOT scary), remember that He will meet you in that place and will provide all that you need every step of the way. Listen for His voice and trust when you hear it.
In Genesis 21, we see that Sarah gave birth to a son (at 100 years old!!!) and she named him Isaac, which means he laughs. How fitting is his name, as Sarah laughed when the Lord told her she would conceive a child in her old age. Sarah and Abraham were very old and naturally should not have been able to have children any longer, but through divine intervention, God fulfilled his promise and allowed them to have children. Isaac was literally the promised child.
Anytime blessings happen, we know that haters are quick to show up on the scene. In this story there are two haters. The first is Isaac’s older half-brother Ishmael, who laughs (mockingly) at Isaac. The second is actually Sarah, who is a big hater of Hagar (Ishmael’s mom). Sarah was mad that Ishmeal was laughing at Isaac, and there was probably a little bit of jealousy and awkwardness because Hagar slept with her husband Abraham, but who’s keeping score? So here is this rich woman Sarah (Abraham had a lot of sheep and stuff) who is mad at a slave woman (Hagar) because of sibling rivalry between Ishmael and Isaac. Sarah goes and complains to her husband and tells him to get rid of Hagar.
And what does Abraham do? After talking to God and calming down a bit, he packs Hagar a picnic basket and tells her and his firstborn son to get lost. Just messy!
So Hagar was tough and headed out to the desert with her son. When she ran out of food and water, she cried out to God because she couldn’t bear to watch her son die. And you know what happened? God heard her cry and led her to a well in the middle of the desert so she could get water for her and her son. God allowed them to survive, and not only that, but he promised that Ishmael would become a great nation one day.
God talks about laughter a lot, He is the inventor of laughter, but let us make sure that we are laughing for the right reasons and not secretly becoming the villains of our own stories. Also, remember when humans fail us, or when we fail ourselves, God is still there and He never fails. In fact, God works all things together for GOOD.
Be encouraged, God keeps His promises even when we become impatient or doubt. God is consistent and loves us enough to pick us back up when we fall, every time we fall. All we have to do is cry out to Him and trust that He will be there.
In Genesis chapter 16, we find Abram and Sarai’s hope fading once again about ever having a child. We are reminded once again that Sarai has bore Abram no children and in this time of waiting for a promise that never seems to come true, Sarai gets the idea that she and Abram can still have a child if Abram sleeps with her handmaid Hagar. Sarai tells this to Abram and he listens to her – he goes along with this plan. It doesn’t say that Abram protested, expressed any opinions, struggled, nothing. It just says that Abram listened to his wife.
So Abram goes and sleeps with this other girl and gets her pregnant. Once his wife Sarai notices that Hagar is pregnant (which must have taken some time, it couldn’t have been immediate) she also noticed a change in Hagar. Hagar started looking down on Sarai and treating her poorly. Hagar was disrespecting the chain of command and that made Sarai angry.
Sarai went to Abram and told him how she felt and Abram was like “look this is your servant, handle it” so Sarai was SO mean to Hagar that Hagar ran away.
Upset, pregnant, probably lacking resources and scared, Hagar went off into the wilderness. An angel came to the wilderness looking for Hagar and began to talk to her about her situation. The angel asked her a very important question, ” where are you coming from and where are you going?” Once the angel heard her out, Hagar was given a blessing saying that she would have a multitude of offspring, but that her son would be a wild and crazy guy. The angel told Hagar to name her son Ishmael which means God hears. Then the angel instructed Hagar to go back to Sarai and submit to her.
Hagar called that place in the wilderness Beer-lahai-roi, meaning the well of the God who sees me, because God saw her in her place of affliction. She went back to Abram and Sarai and gave birth to Ishmael when Abram was 86 years old.
For me, this story touches a place deep in my soul. That place that is waiting for a promise that doesn’t seem to come. The promise that keeps getting told to me, the one I have heard many times and am waiting in anticipation, but I see nothing in my life that points to this promise coming true. Like Abram and Sarai, I have my doubts and sometimes I come up with my own plans to “help” God with His promise, but that never seems to work out. The amazing thing is that the promise is still a promise. God’s word for my life doesn’t change just because I can’t be patient. Abram and Sarai didn’t lose out on their promise just because they tried to figure out their own way of doing things, they just had some added complications to their blessing.
I also greatly appreciate how God dealt with Hagar. She wasn’t trying to mess up anyone’s blessings, but when she got blessed when someone else didn’t, she got a little arrogant. She treated someone she served poorly because she thought she was better than her. That led to some consequences and Sarai treated her poorly as a result. I don’t know what kind of relationship they had before, but even if it was just cordial and professional, that relationship was now broken and both sides were hurt.
Being extremely hurt, Hagar ran away, but God met her in that broken and lonely place and sent someone to talk with and listen to her. I love the question that the angel asks, “where have you come from and where are you going?” It’s a great self reflection question about where we’re at and what led us to get to this place and how are we going to get out of it. A lot of times brokenness, anger, mistakes and sin have caused us to run away to the wilderness, but God sees us and meets us in these lonely places. He will even bless us in our mess, but then He instructs us to turn back to that broken place and return with a different attitude.
Now I imagine that it was extremely hard for Hagar to go back to a broken relationship and submit. I bet it was extremely hard to go back to someone who treated her so harshly and stay in that place and not have content in her heart. I bet it was equally hard for Sarai to accept Hagar back into her presence after she treated her poorly and then seeing Hagar run away, but that’s the beauty of God. He calls us back to the broken places so the His glory can shine.
Now the text doesn’t say that Sarai welcomed Hagar back with open arms, but it also doesn’t say she backhanded her upon arrival. I imagine there was some awkwardness as they both tried to navigate the broken relationship, but I love that God sent Hagar back for the chance to make things right.
Be encouraged, God is the God who sees us. He will keep His promises to us and even if we mess up along the way, he will give us another chance to make things right. He is the God of many chances, so even if you are currently in the wilderness, if you were hurt, if you did the hurting, if you have doubt, if you messed up something so bad that you don’t think it can ever be fixed, know that God hears you and he will give you another chance to go back and try again.
In Genesis chapter 12, we are introduced to Abram and Sarai (later named Abraham and Sarah) a married couple who are in their 70s. They had already lived 7 decades worth of life in Ur (a wealthy land) and were now about to embark on an adventure of a lifetime. God came and spoke to Abram and made him a promise. He said, “Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father’s house, unto a land that I will shew thee.And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing. And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed.”
Basically, God said I need you to go to a new place away from the land and the people you know to do something new. If you do that, I will give you lots of land, you’ll build up a great nation, and anyone who is good to you, I’ll be good to, but anyone who is bad to you is going to get what’s coming.
So at 75 Abram packed up his things, took his wife (Sarai) and his nephew (Lot) and went to the land where the Canaanites were (Ham’s offspring – the ones who were cursed because of what happened with Noah… there was some tension there). God told Abram that He was going to give this land to Abram’s offspring (note that promise of offspring for later), but Abram kept travelling. There was a famine (lack of food and resources) in the land, so he decided to go on down to Egypt.
When he got to Egypt, he noticed that his wife was getting a lot of attention because she was good looking and he was scared that if they knew he was married to her, they would kill him. Being scared, he asked his wife to lie and say that she was his sister. Now Pharaoh liked what he saw, so he wanted to put a ring on Sarai. Thinking that she was Abram’s sister, he took her to his palace to be his wife. God didn’t seem to be to pleased with this, because he sent all kinds of plagues to Pharaoh’s house. Pharaoh was not pleased.
Once Pharaoh learned what the truth was, he yelled at Abram for lying to him, gave him back his wife and told him to take his things and go. And that’s what he did. Abram wasn’t killed, it doesn’t say what God thought of the lying (it seems like He was mad about the potential adulatory part though because – the plagues), and Abram and his family got to keep all their possessions. And that’s how we end chapter 12.
I think the takeaways from this are that God can use you at any age. At 75 Abram left all that he knew to start over, he just had to be willing to go. The same is true for us. At any age, if we are called to a new journey, we just need to be willing to pack up our things and go. That being said, we need to remember God’s promises and not get scared away from what we’re supposed to do.
God promised Abram that he would have land, have a nation, and that people that were good to him would be blessed and those that were bad to him would be cursed. Pharaoh experienced that first hand with the plagues. So why did Abram fear that he would be killed when he went to Egypt? It’s simple – doubt.
Abram (like most of us – me in particular) doubted the promise of God. Maybe it was because people hadn’t followed through on their promises to him over his 75 years on the Earth, maybe it was because God gave his promise and Abram expected the promise to come out of a microwave like some golden holy Hot Pocket ready to consume, or maybe Abram doubted that God could use someone like him. We don’t know the reason, but he doubted for sure.
Just like Abram, we doubt what we heard too. We doubt our callings, especially in the waiting period. But can I give you a great revelation that I had the other day? A homemade meal that takes all day to cook and heats the house up to a million degrees and makes you sweat and causes your stomach to grumble during the preparation process and makes you think about food ALL DAY LONG tastes a billion times better than a hot pocket. I’m not saying that God can’t move quickly on the promises He has given you, but what I am saying is that if He doesn’t move quickly it’s just because He is preparing something that will taste delicious and just needs a little more time in the oven. Be encouraged, He keeps His promises!!
Genesis chapter 10 is a look into how the Earth was repopulated after the Flood. Through the sons of Noah, we see 70 different nations emerge spreading all across the Earth. From the East to the West, from the Amorites to the Philistines and all the nations in between, the Earth once again has been populated. With that, we also see that God is the God of all people.
From Noah’s descendants, we see that even the nations that later went on to battle and become enemies of the Israelites came from the same blood line. And to go back even further, before Noah, all of humanity originated from Adam and Eve. This genealogy account further shows that.
We also see that life went on even after Noah’s missteps and Ham’s poor judgement. God did not wipe out their family line, in fact He even allowed for great people to come from their family line like Nimrod the great hunter and eventually Abraham the father of many nations.
What I particularly like about this chapter is that we are all related. We all came from the same family line, under the same God, and although we have branched out and have our own languages and values, our origin story is the same. We have great people in our family line and some not so great people. Everyone is human, we all make mistakes, some people are amazing and some are amazingly horrible, but we all bleed the same blood.
Be encouraged, for you come from a great family tree that was designed by the Creator Himself! This is just the beginning. This is your origin story!
In Genesis chapter 9, we see that Noah and his family have left the ark and God has blessed them and told them to go forth and multiply, just as He told Adam and Eve in the garden. The Earth had been wiped clean of all humanity and it was Noah’s sons who were to repopulate. In addition to this, God commands mankind to look after the Earth, all the animals, He allows them to eat the animals now as long as they drain the blood from the animals (no drinking blood and do not torture the animals, kill them humanely), and lastly God says that anyone who murders someone is to be killed. He ends His instructions by retelling Noah and his family to be fruitful and multiply.
After He gives instructions, God makes a promise that he will never take out the whole Earth again by a flood. To show a sign of his promise, He put a rainbow in the sky. What comfort that must have been to these lone survivors of the great flood. I wonder how many times they saw rain and though the flood might happen again, but then saw the rainbow and were relieved by God’s promise.
As with most things in life, after an amazing life changing moment or a great travesty, life went back to normal and people reverted back to known behaviors. Noah planted a vineyard and got drunk. It doesn’t say why this happened or how Noah was feeling or what led him to this, it just says that he got drunk and laid uncovered (naked) in his tent. This was not how a great man, the only man who found favor with God in wicked times, was supposed to act. He was supposed to be great all the time, and yet we see his humanness. We see him act differently than we expect. Despite the excuse or the reason, we only see the action.
Now does this mean that God took away His promise from Noah or that He was mad and punished Noah? No, in fact the text doesn’t make any mention to God’s feelings on this situation. Additionally, we still see rainbows in the sky to this day and are reminded of God’s promise. What we do see are consequences and an aftermath that happens as a result of Noah’s actions though.
We are told that Noah’s youngest son sees his nakedness and tells his brothers. The brothers cover their father with a garment and never see the nakedness of their father. After Noah wakes up, he learns what happened and curses (Noah curses, not God) his youngest son for what he did.
Now there is a lot of speculation on what actually happened and why it was so bad. Here’s what I know. Noah’s youngest son saw something and did nothing about it except to tell others. The older boys covered their father and didn’t look. It could be as simple as that. Nakedness implies a level of vulnerability and especially if Noah was in a drunken state, he was not himself and was probably even more vulnerable than normal. The youngest son did not protect this vulnerability, but the older ones did without asking for specifics or digging into the matter. They did not need to see what state their father was in, they just covered him.
That is what family is supposed to do. When you are at your lowest point, when you have misstepped, when you have found yourself in a vulnerable place, family is there to cover you no questions asked. Family might mean different things to everyone. It could be your family of origin, your close friends, or other believers, but family are those you are familiar with that surround you. They won’t be perfect all the time, but they will cover you and you need to cover them too.
Be encouraged, we have all survived the floods of life, we see the rainbow promise in the sky that God won’t wipe out His creation, and your family (even the family you have in believers just reading this post) will cover you and pray for you. You were made in God’s image and are fearfully and wonderfully made and there is nothing you can do to make God forget His promise or His people. Be blessed.
Chapter 5 of Genesis is all about family ties and genealogy. On the surface, it is a list of names and ages that seems boring and easy to skip over. Who cares if so-and-so’s great-grandfather lived to be 900 and had a wooden leg, where is the action? The drama? Where is the storyline?
In a society that craves more and more action and suspense, more “realistic” or gruesome depictions of violence and needs a new image on screen every 3-5 seconds or so, it can be difficult to find the importance in the seemingly mundane. Occasionally, you’ll find a rare long shot in a movie that goes on for a bit, but chances are you squirm in your seat if there’s not a lot of action going on in that scene. Similarly, unless you are reading a tweet that is 140 characters or less, longer written material has a hard time keeping people’s attention span these days. I’m here to say that sometimes when you skip over the “boring parts”, you can miss some important plot points.
In the first few lines of the text, we are reminded that humans were created in God’s image and that he created male and female with no distinction of inequality amongst the sexes. The following verses tell us that the descendants of Adam lived very long lives, but it does not give us a great description of their lives or achievements aside from their ages. There are a few exceptions we will get to, but it is something to think about that these people were important enough to mention in the Bible, but that none of their achievements or hobbies or anything really about them was mentioned.
I think for many of us, that is our fear. That we will die “having accomplished nothing”. That no one will remember us. There is one notable man in this text though that had more written about him that the others. Enoch.
Enoch is the only one in this chapter that is said to have walked with God. And as a result, Enoch did not die. It says that God took him. He got the red carpet treatment and walked with God straight into heaven. Now that is a notable achievement! And it doesn’t even seem that Enoch was trying to accomplish anything, or that his goal was to get into heaven. Enoch just did what he regularly did, walked with God.
After Enoch, we meet Methuselah who is the oldest man in the text at age 969. It seems that God was patient with mankind, allowing their lifespans to be long as they figured out how to function on Earth. Many times throughout history, we see people longing for and trying to accomplish immortality. My question is why? Even this man who lived for almost 1,000 years is only mentioned because he lived, had a child that continued the blood line and then died.
In comparison to Enoch, I think there is a lesson to learn here. It is not the number of years you have lived on this Earth that are important, but what you have done with the years you have been given. The quality of life, of what you have chosen to do with you life, is what is important.
The last part of the text leads us to a man named Noah. Now, we will get more into Noah’s story in a later chapter, but it is good to note Noah’s significance here. Noah is the only person in this chapter to have the meaning of his name explained. Verse 29 says, “And he called his name Noah, saying, This same shall comfort us concerning our work and toil of our hands, because of the ground which the LORD hath cursed.” Noah’s name sounds similar to the Hebrew word for rest, and so it seems that his father believed that Noah would come and give the people rest from the curse of Adam (back in chapter 3 of Genesis).
All of that being said, just remember that there is significance in everything, even the chapters in your life that seem boring or unimportant. Sometimes those boring chapters can be a set up for the adventure that is yet to come!
Coffee House Word 