Author: SFJ Bible

Genesis 23

Sarah’s Death and Burial

23:1 Sarah lived 127 years; these were the years of the life of Sarah. 2 And Sarah died at Kiriath-arba (that is, Hebron) in the land of Canaan, and Abraham went in to mourn for Sarah and to weep for her. 3 And Abraham rose up from before his dead and said to the Hittites,¹ 4 “I am a sojourner and foreigner among you; give me property among you for a burying place, that I may bury my dead out of my sight.” 5 The Hittites answered Abraham, 6 “Hear us, my lord; you are a prince of God² among us. Bury your dead in the choicest of our tombs. None of us will withhold from you his tomb to hinder you from burying your dead.” 7 Abraham rose and bowed to the Hittites, the people of the land. 8 And he said to them, “If you are willing that I should bury my dead out of my sight, hear me and entreat for me Ephron the son of Zohar, 9 that he may give me the cave of Machpelah, which he owns; it is at the end of his field. For the full price let him give it to me in your presence as property for a burying place.”

10 Now Ephron was sitting among the Hittites, and Ephron the Hittite answered Abraham in the hearing of the Hittites, of all who went in at the gate of his city, 11 “No, my lord, hear me: I give you the field, and I give you the cave that is in it. In the sight of the sons of my people I give it to you. Bury your dead.” 12 Then Abraham bowed down before the people of the land. 13 And he said to Ephron in the hearing of the people of the land, “But if you will, hear me: I give the price of the field. Accept it from me, that I may bury my dead there.” 14 Ephron answered Abraham, 15 “My lord, listen to me: a piece of land worth four hundred shekels³ of silver, what is that between you and me? Bury your dead.” 16 Abraham listened to Ephron, and Abraham weighed out for Ephron the silver that he had named in the hearing of the Hittites, four hundred shekels of silver, according to the weights current among the merchants.

17 So the field of Ephron in Machpelah, which was to the east of Mamre, the field with the cave that was in it and all the trees that were in the field, throughout its whole area, was made over 18 to Abraham as a possession in the presence of the Hittites, before all who went in at the gate of his city. 19 After this, Abraham buried Sarah his wife in the cave of the field of Machpelah east of Mamre (that is, Hebron) in the land of Canaan. 20 The field and the cave that is in it were made over to Abraham as property for a burying place by the Hittites.

Footnotes

[1] 23:3 Hebrew sons of Heth; also verses 5, 7, 10, 16, 18, 20

[2] 23:6 Or a mighty prince

[3] 23:15 A shekel was about 2/5 ounce or 11 grams

(ESV)

Genesis 22

The Sacrifice of Isaac

22:1 After these things God tested Abraham and said to him, “Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.” 2 He said, “Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you.” 3 So Abraham rose early in the morning, saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him, and his son Isaac. And he cut the wood for the burnt offering and arose and went to the place of which God had told him. 4 On the third day Abraham lifted up his eyes and saw the place from afar. 5 Then Abraham said to his young men, “Stay here with the donkey; I and the boy¹ will go over there and worship and come again to you.” 6 And Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac his son. And he took in his hand the fire and the knife. So they went both of them together. 7 And Isaac said to his father Abraham, “My father!” And he said, “Here I am, my son.” He said, “Behold, the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?” 8 Abraham said, “God will provide for himself the lamb for a burnt offering, my son.” So they went both of them together.

9 When they came to the place of which God had told him, Abraham built the altar there and laid the wood in order and bound Isaac his son and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood. 10 Then Abraham reached out his hand and took the knife to slaughter his son. 11 But the angel of the LORD called to him from heaven and said, “Abraham, Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.” 12 He said, “Do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him, for now I know that you fear God, seeing you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me.” 13 And Abraham lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, behind him was a ram, caught in a thicket by his horns. And Abraham went and took the ram and offered it up as a burnt offering instead of his son. 14 So Abraham called the name of that place, “The LORD will provide”;² as it is said to this day, “On the mount of the LORD it shall be provided.”³

15 And the angel of the LORD called to Abraham a second time from heaven 16 and said, “By myself I have sworn, declares the LORD, because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, 17 I will surely bless you, and I will surely multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven and as the sand that is on the seashore. And your offspring shall possess the gate of his⁴ enemies, 18 and in your offspring shall all the nations of the earth be blessed, because you have obeyed my voice.” 19 So Abraham returned to his young men, and they arose and went together to Beersheba. And Abraham lived at Beersheba.

20 Now after these things it was told to Abraham, “Behold, Milcah also has borne children to your brother Nahor: 21 Uz his firstborn, Buz his brother, Kemuel the father of Aram, 22 Chesed, Hazo, Pildash, Jidlaph, and Bethuel.” 23 (Bethuel fathered Rebekah.) These eight Milcah bore to Nahor, Abraham’s brother. 24 Moreover, his concubine, whose name was Reumah, bore Tebah, Gaham, Tahash, and Maacah.

Footnotes

[1] 22:5 Or young man; also verse 12

[2] 22:14 Or will see

[3] 22:14 Or he will be seen

[4] 22:17 Or their

(ESV)

Genesis 21

The Birth of Isaac

21:1 The LORD visited Sarah as he had said, and the LORD did to Sarah as he had promised. 2 And Sarah conceived and bore Abraham a son in his old age at the time of which God had spoken to him. 3 Abraham called the name of his son who was born to him, whom Sarah bore him, Isaac.¹ 4 And Abraham circumcised his son Isaac when he was eight days old, as God had commanded him. 5 Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him. 6 And Sarah said, “God has made laughter for me; everyone who hears will laugh over me.” 7 And she said, “Who would have said to Abraham that Sarah would nurse children? Yet I have borne him a son in his old age.”

God Protects Hagar and Ishmael

8 And the child grew and was weaned. And Abraham made a great feast on the day that Isaac was weaned. 9 But Sarah saw the son of Hagar the Egyptian, whom she had borne to Abraham, laughing.² 10 So she said to Abraham, “Cast out this slave woman with her son, for the son of this slave woman shall not be heir with my son Isaac.” 11 And the thing was very displeasing to Abraham on account of his son. 12 But God said to Abraham, “Be not displeased because of the boy and because of your slave woman. Whatever Sarah says to you, do as she tells you, for through Isaac shall your offspring be named. 13 And I will make a nation of the son of the slave woman also, because he is your offspring.” 14 So Abraham rose early in the morning and took bread and a skin of water and gave it to Hagar, putting it on her shoulder, along with the child, and sent her away. And she departed and wandered in the wilderness of Beersheba.

15 When the water in the skin was gone, she put the child under one of the bushes. 16 Then she went and sat down opposite him a good way off, about the distance of a bowshot, for she said, “Let me not look on the death of the child.” And as she sat opposite him, she lifted up her voice and wept. 17 And God heard the voice of the boy, and the angel of God called to Hagar from heaven and said to her, “What troubles you, Hagar? Fear not, for God has heard the voice of the boy where he is. 18 Up! Lift up the boy, and hold him fast with your hand, for I will make him into a great nation.” 19 Then God opened her eyes, and she saw a well of water. And she went and filled the skin with water and gave the boy a drink. 20 And God was with the boy, and he grew up. He lived in the wilderness and became an expert with the bow. 21 He lived in the wilderness of Paran, and his mother took a wife for him from the land of Egypt.

A Treaty with Abimelech

22 At that time Abimelech and Phicol the commander of his army said to Abraham, “God is with you in all that you do. 23 Now therefore swear to me here by God that you will not deal falsely with me or with my descendants or with my posterity, but as I have dealt kindly with you, so you will deal with me and with the land where you have sojourned.” 24 And Abraham said, “I will swear.”

25 When Abraham reproved Abimelech about a well of water that Abimelech’s servants had seized, 26 Abimelech said, “I do not know who has done this thing; you did not tell me, and I have not heard of it until today.” 27 So Abraham took sheep and oxen and gave them to Abimelech, and the two men made a covenant. 28 Abraham set seven ewe lambs of the flock apart. 29 And Abimelech said to Abraham, “What is the meaning of these seven ewe lambs that you have set apart?” 30 He said, “These seven ewe lambs you will take from my hand, that this³ may be a witness for me that I dug this well.” 31 Therefore that place was called Beersheba,⁴ because there both of them swore an oath. 32 So they made a covenant at Beersheba. Then Abimelech and Phicol the commander of his army rose up and returned to the land of the Philistines. 33 Abraham planted a tamarisk tree in Beersheba and called there on the name of the LORD, the Everlasting God. 34 And Abraham sojourned many days in the land of the Philistines.

Footnotes

[1] 21:3 Isaac means he laughs

[2] 21:9 Possibly laughing in mockery

[3] 21:30 Or you

[4] 21:31 Beersheba means well of seven or well of the oath

(ESV)

Going Deeper

Genesis chapters 16-20 (9-30-17)

Read: Genesis 16

Here we read about Sarai’s lack of patience for God’s perfect timing to deliver on His promises; she sinfully and hastily gives her slave girl to her husband and tells him to sleep with her to get this promise lineage started. Like a flesh driven man, Abram doesn’t stand fast for the Lord’s promise and sleeps with Hagar the slave and impregnates her with a son named Ishmael. Even Sarai’s lack of selfless love for Hagar after she realizes her mistake is another testimony of sin at work in us.

We are so impatient, even when God is so faithful to fulfill all His promises.

We must also remember that our time is not God’s time. Peter says in 2 Peter 3:8, “But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.”

Here, Peter is quoting Psalm 90:4. This is a great reminder to us, the Church!

He is saying that from our viewpoint, the last days can feel like a long time. It doesn’t feel very “last” when it’s a couple thousand years. But from God’s point of view, it is very, very short.

We can’t confine God to our schedule.

Isaiah 55:8-9 “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord.

For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”

It is for our good that God doesn’t govern the world’s affairs or our lives by our timing or our will.

There is a parable I used to tell my students that I think illustrates this well. It goes like this:

When Jimmy was a little boy, he wanted to be a cowboy. He spent countless hours in front of the television, watching reruns of “Gun smoke” and “Bonanza.” He just knew that someday he would live on a ranch, wear a big cowboy hat, and ride the range, just like all his cowboy heroes.

When he was seven years old, Jimmy said, “Dad, I want to be a cowboy when I grow up. Will you help me be a cowboy?”

“Sure, son,” said his dad, smiling down at his little cowpoke. As the years went by, Jimmy grew into a fine young man. As you might expect, he outgrew his childhood fantasy of becoming a cowboy, and turned instead to girls, sports, studying, and preparing himself for a career in the business world.

One day, Jimmy went to his dad again and said, “Dad, I want to go to medical school and become a doctor. Will you help me?”  His dad said, “Medical school? Son, I can’t afford to send you to medical school. When you were seven, you said you wanted to be a cowboy. So, I saved and bought you a ranch in Texas with 50 head of cattle! There’s no money for you to go to medical school. Besides, you need to take care of that ranch. It’s all yours.”

“But Dad!” said Jimmy, “I was just a child when I said that! I didn’t know then what I know now! I don’t want to heard cattle! I want to save lives.”

Can you imagine what our lives would be like if God gave us all what we asked for?

When I was young, there were so many rules my parents had for me, and so many decisions they made that I totally disagreed with. Now, looking back, I can see without a doubt in my mind how good those rules and decisions were for me. The truth is I simply couldn’t see what they could. I didn’t know what they knew.

I didn’t know how to make patient decisions that would be formative for who I needed to become.

My sin wanted what I wanted and when I wanted it.

Praise God that He is wise and rules our lives in His infinite wisdom!

Praise God that He is God and we are not.

Praise God that He knows best and governs all things according to His perfect will and not mine!

In Genesis 17:1-8, God gave Abraham the rite of physical circumcision as the specific sign of the natural (or ethnic) layer of the Abrahamic Covenant.

Read: Genesis 17:9-14 

Under the Old Covenant, all males in Abraham’s line were to be circumcised and thus carry with them a lifelong mark in their flesh that they were part of God’s Old Covenant people. Any descendant of Abraham who refused circumcision was declaring himself to be outside of God’s covenant. This was a sign for the chosen people of God, just as baptism is a sign of the chosen and redeemed people of God in the New Covenant.

Abraham’s faith is finally rewarded in Genesis 21 with the birth of Isaac. We will get to that next week.

But don’t forget: Abraham did some amazing acts of faith, but he struggled in this area too.

Not only did Abraham show a lack of faith when in hostile lands a couple times, but we also know that the frustration of not having a child got to Abraham and Sarah as they carried out their man-made plan–a plan to have a child through Sarah’s servant, Hagar (Genesis 16:1-15). The birth of Ishmael not only demonstrates the futility of Abraham’s folly and lack of faith but also the grace of God (in allowing the birth to take place and even blessing Ishmael).

So, Abraham, who is considered the “father of the faithful,” surely had his moments of doubt and disbelief, yet he still is exalted among men as an example of the faithful life. No matter how you have failed in faith, know that God will give true perseverance for His saved ones. If He gave you true saving faith, then in faith you will finish this race called life.

We are marked as saved by God in baptism, and we will be His forever, for Christ will lose none of His true sheep.

John 10:27-29 “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me. And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of My Father’s hand.”

If you died to self and truly trust your life to Jesus Christ, you will finish in faith, for you are hidden with Christ in God.

Colossians 3:1-4 Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.       

If you have struggled to make things happen in your time or have walked by sight and not by faith, then repent from these practices of old and turn to Jesus, and commit to trusting in His timing and His ways for your life. For He is your Lord, and He will raise you up on the last day. Praise be to God.

By His grace and for His glory,

-Shepherd

Soldiers for Jesus MC

Genesis 20

Abraham and Abimelech

20:1 From there Abraham journeyed toward the territory of the Negeb and lived between Kadesh and Shur; and he sojourned in Gerar. 2 And Abraham said of Sarah his wife, “She is my sister.” And Abimelech king of Gerar sent and took Sarah. 3 But God came to Abimelech in a dream by night and said to him, “Behold, you are a dead man because of the woman whom you have taken, for she is a man’s wife.” 4 Now Abimelech had not approached her. So he said, “Lord, will you kill an innocent people? 5 Did he not himself say to me, ‘She is my sister’? And she herself said, ‘He is my brother.’ In the integrity of my heart and the innocence of my hands I have done this.” 6 Then God said to him in the dream, “Yes, I know that you have done this in the integrity of your heart, and it was I who kept you from sinning against me. Therefore I did not let you touch her. 7 Now then, return the man’s wife, for he is a prophet, so that he will pray for you, and you shall live. But if you do not return her, know that you shall surely die, you and all who are yours.”

8 So Abimelech rose early in the morning and called all his servants and told them all these things. And the men were very much afraid. 9 Then Abimelech called Abraham and said to him, “What have you done to us? And how have I sinned against you, that you have brought on me and my kingdom a great sin? You have done to me things that ought not to be done.” 10 And Abimelech said to Abraham, “What did you see, that you did this thing?” 11 Abraham said, “I did it because I thought, ‘There is no fear of God at all in this place, and they will kill me because of my wife.’ 12 Besides, she is indeed my sister, the daughter of my father though not the daughter of my mother, and she became my wife. 13 And when God caused me to wander from my father’s house, I said to her, ‘This is the kindness you must do me: at every place to which we come, say of me, “He is my brother.”’”

14 Then Abimelech took sheep and oxen, and male servants and female servants, and gave them to Abraham, and returned Sarah his wife to him. 15 And Abimelech said, “Behold, my land is before you; dwell where it pleases you.” 16 To Sarah he said, “Behold, I have given your brother a thousand pieces of silver. It is a sign of your innocence in the eyes of all¹ who are with you, and before everyone you are vindicated.” 17 Then Abraham prayed to God, and God healed Abimelech, and also healed his wife and female slaves so that they bore children. 18 For the LORD had closed all the wombs of the house of Abimelech because of Sarah, Abraham’s wife.

Footnotes

[1] 20:16 Hebrew It is a covering of eyes for all

(ESV)