Trusting God in Deceptive Times

 Read Genesis 31

Jacob’s nom de guerre was deceiver and it seemed that he lived up to that nickname. He deceived his father.  He deceived Laban after Laban deceived him, and so we must consider this whole striped and speckled animal business.

Was Jacob really so smart as to deceive Laban into surrendering most of his flocks?  Jacob said he would take the odd balls—the darker, spotted, or striped animals from the herd as his wages.  Then without explanation as far as Laban knew, more and more newly born animals fit this description.  Laban had to be thinking, the fix was in, but how?

We might be thinking that Jacob was just a shrewd dude, and there would be something to that.  He did put the branches in the water and more and more animals were born spotted or speckled or somehow less than perfect in appearance.

But now we see in something of a literary flashback, that God had told Jacob that this would happen.  Did he tell Jacob to speed the process along by putting the branches in the water?  We don’t know, but it gives us a little better perspective of Jacob.

I will stay with the assessment that he was shrewd but I will not go so far as to say he was conniving.  Why?  Listen to what the Lord said to Jacob.

So Jacob sent word to Rachel and Leah to come out to the fields where his flocks were.  He said to them, “I see that your father’s attitude toward me is not what it was before, but the God of my father has been with me. You know that I’ve worked for your father with all my strength, yet your father has cheated me by changing my wages ten times. However, God has not allowed him to harm me. If he said, ‘The speckled ones will be your wages,’ then all the flocks gave birth to speckled young; and if he said, ‘The streaked ones will be your wages,’ then all the flocks bore streaked young. So God has taken away your father’s livestock and has given them to me.

“In breeding season I once had a dream in which I looked up and saw that the male goats mating with the flock were streaked, speckled or spotted. The angel of God said to me in the dream, ‘Jacob.’ I answered, ‘Here I am.’ And he said, ‘Look up and see that all the male goats mating with the flock are streaked, speckled or spotted, for I have seen all that Laban has been doing to you. I am the God of Bethel, where you anointed a pillar and where you made a vow to me. Now leave this land at once and go back to your native land.’”

It seems that Jacob was not swindling Laban out of anything.  God saw fit to reward Jacob—one of his chosen in the line of the Father of Many Nations—and punish Laban.  Both were a bit on the deceptive side, but Jacob had been given a mission by God. Jacob was faithful to God.

Jacob would put this Father of Many Nations thing into high gear and God would continue to bless him.  The whole putting branches in the water may have just been the part that God gave Jacob to do. It may have been a test of faith and the branches didn’t really impact the genetics.

The sequence of events suggests that this was Jacob’s idea, but it is a common literary tool to present one scene and then offer the explanation sometime later.  I think that’s what we see here.  God was blessing Jacob.  God was redeeming the years of service to Laban with blessings from above.  Those blessings just happened to be born with speckles or streaks.

I’m thinking that I will go ahead and claim 2 Ukrainians and 4 illegal immigrants as dependents on my taxes and hope that God sends me a message that this is how it’s supposed to be.  It might not work that way.

This screwball deceiver of a man was chosen by God to accelerate this Father of Many Nations business.  He, with the help of 4 different women, did just that, and God blessed this knucklehead.

Sometimes, I look around and think things couldn’t be more screwed up than they are in our time, but…

What if all the self-destructive things that our government is doing, gets us closer to that glorious day that is coming?

What if, all this trans gender, pick a gender, and gender blender stuff just gets us closer to the coming of the Lord?

What if the fact that kids just can’t make change any more without a computerized register moves us closer to the end of this age and the beginning of the age to come?

What if all of the nuclear chest pounding just moves us a little closer to the battle to come at Armageddon?  That part sort of stinks.  The whole world going to war in one place and I’m left to guard the north end of Burns Flat.  But what if all of the insanity in the world just gets us to not only the end of the age but to the reward, the inheritance, the abundant and eternal life stored up for us?

Maybe, it’s time to understand that the ways of the world are the ways of the world but God will use them for good for those who love him and are called according to his purpose. Maybe, I need to understand that God will use the most hard-headed of hard heads to do his work. That one hits close to home

If I ever meet Jacob in heaven, I’m not going to transact any business with him.  I’m not making any deals with him.  I’m not buying his stew or letting him manage my livestock.  I’m not going to try my card tricks on him either.

I’m not having any dealings with that guy, but God used him with all of his short comings and with his deceptive nature to advance this Father of Many Nations business.

I think that I had better learn to trust in the Lord with everything I have more now than ever before.  I need to practice walking by faith not sight more in this time of deceit than ever before.

George Orwell once wrote that history ended in 1936.  He said it because in the Spanish Civil War battles were reported that never occurred.  Casualties were recorded in battles that didn’t happen.   

We saw the same thing in Vietnam with enemy body counts.  We see that fake news is just the norm in so much of our century. 

The Spanish Civil War put this fake news business into high gear and that was almost a century ago.

We live in a world of deceit, but God will not let the deceptiveness of the world cheat us out of what he has promised.  God rewards those who trust him and seek him and obey him.

So, where does that leave us?

Know the story of Jacob and Laban, Jacob and his wives, and Jacob and his God, but live trusting that God will use us with all of our flaws in a deceptive world that is doing everything it can to deny that God even exists.

God loves you as you are.  He doesn’t want to leave you there.  He wants you to grow in his grace, but he loves every broken part of you and will use you fulfill his plan and bring glory to his name.

Know these Old Testament stories.  They are important to your growth.  But know and live in the certainty that God loves you as you are.  He wants you to grow in his grace but he loves every broken piece of you.

He even uses hardheads to advance his gospel. I know that one for sure.

God loves you just as you are and will use you to bring glory to his name.  Trust him all the more in an age where it’s hard to trust anyone or anything.

Amen.

 

Let the World Contend with Us!

 Read Genesis 26

Now there was a famine in the land.  We know dry and very dry conditions where we live.  We are on the brink of being a desert, but have been spared from that because the rains do come.

We have seen selective food shortages, but never scarcity on the level that would become famine.  I’m not sure that we could survive famine in this country.  When the people were afraid of shortages, what did they buy?

Toilet paper!

But there was famine and Isaac went to the land of the Philistines and King Abimelech.  God had told him not to go to Egypt as his father had done.  Abimelech received Isaac.

While his welcome seemed hospitable, Isaac did not trust Abimelech or the people of this area.  When asked about Rebekah, Isaac used his father’s trick to try to save his own hide.

She is my sister.

We have heard that before from Abraham.  One time when Abraham did this, it was with Abimelech.  I’m thinking like father, like son.

When that doctor asked me, "Son, how'd you get in this condition?"

I said, "A-hey, Sawbones, I'm just carrying on an old family tradition"

Mark this date on your calendars.  Hank Williams Jr. made it into a sermon.  I could have used his lyrics last week talking about Esau.

I got a shotgun, a rifle, and a 4-wheel drive

And a country boy can survive

How was the husband-wife relationship discovered?  Abimelech saw Isaac caressing Rebekah. You might think that the presence of children might have been a giveaway, but it appears that Esau and Jacob were grown men at this time.

Abimelech could have sent Isaac away, but he knew that Isaac, like his father Abraham, was blessed by the Lord.  This pagan ruler knew that there was a powerful, almighty God who protected Abraham.

So, the king issued a directive to his people that neither Isaac nor Rebekah was to be touched.  They had the king’s protection. The king addressed Isaac’s fears instead of confronting him.

The king did not worship the God of Abraham and Isaac, but he knew to fear him. When Abraham had pulled this same my wife is my sister stunt with the king, God had spoken to Abimelech in a dream and said, “You are as good as dead,”

Abimelech had some first-hand experience with the God of Abraham and now Isaac. He knew to fear this God.  He knew not to hurt the one whom God had blessed.

So, when the husband and wife relationship was discovered, Abimelech did not send Isaac away, he granted them protection.

For the first time since Noah planted a vineyard, we see a reference to planting crops.  Isaac had a true bumper crop and he became very rich.  In spite of his my wife is my sister ploy, God had blessed him.

Isaac not only had riches from his crops but from his herds as well.  He grew and grew. While Abimelech placed his protection upon Isaac and Rebekah; he did not extend this protection to the things that Isaac needed.

The Philistine people resented Isaac. They envied him.  They found a loophole in the king’s protection.  They filled in the wells that Abraham dug when he was in this area. Tensions were high.

So, king Abimelech told Isaac that he had become too powerful and needed to move away.  Like it or not, it seems that the nomadic nature of his father had passed to him.

Despite the bountiful crops attached to the land where he lived, Isaac packed up and moved. He obviously didn’t move too far as he continued to live in an area influenced by the Philistines.

He re-dug wells.  These were wells that his father had made and then the Philistines had filled in after Abraham died.  There was once again tension between Isaac and the Philistine herdsmen.

Only when Isaac dug a third well, did the tension subside.  That well was named Rehoboth because there was room for everyone now. 

Isaac now had enough room between him and the Philistines.  That would be the last he would see of King Abimelech, except that it wasn’t.

Abimelech came to see Isaac.  He brought his personal advisor and his military commander.

Isaac asked, “What now? You asked me to leave.  I left.  What now?”  That’s a bit of a paraphrase but faithful to the original text.

What now?

Abimelech had recognized how powerful Isaac had become.  Physical displacement would not solve all of the king’s problems. There was still a force with which he had to contend camped out in his backyard.  Abimelech surely knew of Abraham’s military success in defeating 4 sizeable armies.  Could he risk that Abraham’s son might be capable of the same thing?

And this God of Abraham and Isaac was a powerful God.  He didn’t want to be on the wrong side if this God intervened in military matters.  Abimelech needed a treaty.

Isaac was a little resentful that he had been sent away, but Abimelech reminded him that he was sent away peacefully and that his God had blessed him wherever he went.  He had prospered in the land but the time had come to put some distance between Isaac and the bulk of the Philistines.

Isaac agreed to the terms and each party swore not to hurt the other.

Was this a sign of weakness on the part of the king?  Not likely as the king who had a treaty with the son of Abraham, now had an alliance. This treaty might deter others who thought they could take on the Philistines.

Isaac put on a feast to commemorate the agreement and the king and his advisors left peacefully.

After they had departed, Isaac’s servants reported they had dug and found water once again.  The well and the town were named Beersheba, after the oath that had been sworn earlier.  This was the well of the oath.

There is a little more at the end of the chapter but it fits in better with what follows. 

So, what did we learn in this chapter?

God continued to bless the line of Abraham.  The promise of many descendants would be carried out in Isaac’s children and their children.  They would be too numerous to count.

God was recognized by some in the pagan world.  They did not have a relationship with him, but they at least knew to fear him.

Isaac made this my wife is my sister bit a family tradition.  Dad tried it twice and it worked for him.  Isaac was blessed with a bumper crop and his herds continued to grow after his ploy was exposed by Abimelech.

Isaac, like his father, was nomadic.  He never stayed in one place too long.

We see a bit more of the story that leads to a chosen people, a Promised Land, and the law given by God,

We see a bit more of the lineage that will one day lead to the one through whom we know that God loves the world so much.  It’s a line that leads to Christ Jesus.

How do we relate this to anything in our current century?

OK, many of you have dug wells or hired someone to do that.  People generally don’t come and fill them in or threaten you claiming that your well is their well. Maybe that’s not the best connection.

How about the world will have to contend with those blessed by God. 

I have mentioned many times that we are blessed to live where we live.  Seldom are we confronted for our faith.  We are rarely threatened.

But a time is coming when lawlessness will prevail upon this earth.  We may live to see it, but we should not fear it for God will bless those who trust him, obey him, and follow him—who follow Jesus.

Our lives may be threatened and even taken from us, but God provides for those whom he blesses and we have received his blessing in Christ Jesus.

So, as we approach the end times—that could be really soon or decades or even centuries away—let the world contend with us as we trust, obey, and follow the one true God.

We often think about how we will contend with the world.  Let us see the life before us, seek God and his kingdom and his righteousness, trust him, obey him, and put the words of our Master into practice.

Let the world contend with us for our course is set with eyes fixed on Jesus.

Yes, we will have trouble in the world, but we don’t bargain with the world.  We accept, trust, and obey the word of God.

We follow Jesus and put his words into practice. God’s blessings are already upon us.

Amen.

A Wife for Isaac

 Read Genesis 24

The chapter begins not by telling us that Abraham is old but by stating he was very old.  He was also tremendously blessed.  Abraham had himself some stuff and a trusted servant to manage everything.

He had the son that God promised him but his son had no wife and the prospects for finding the right wife in the land where he lived were zero.  This was pagan country.

Those who surrounded Abraham surely knew of his God and perhaps even feared his God but they had no relationship with the one true God.  Abraham was something of an enigma.

He was a powerful man blessed by a powerful God, but the people around him did not seek this God.

Though they had many idols and knew not to mess with the God of Abraham, they were essentially godless people.

In the first service, we looked at the oath taken by the servant and his sojourn to the well in northern Mesopotamia.

We learned about the servant’s prayer and how the answer to that prayer singled out Rebekah as the woman most likely to be Isaac’s wife, but the work of the servant was not yet done.

Just who was this girl?

She was the daughter of Bethuel, the son of Nahor and Milcah. Now it was time to meet the parents, but first, it was time to pray again.

Then the man bowed down and worshiped the Lord, saying, “Praise be to the Lord, the God of my master Abraham, who has not abandoned his kindness and faithfulness to my master. As for me, the Lord has led me on the journey to the house of my master’s relatives.”

God was still blessing Abraham, now through his servant in the land of his brother’s family.  His brother’s family also knew to show hospitality. 

The servant and his caravan would be put up at the home of Rachel’s parents.  She also had a brother named Laban.  Watch out for that rascal when Isaac’s son needs a wife but for now, he welcomed the servant.

“Come, you who are blessed by the Lord,” he said. “Why are you standing out here? I have prepared the house and a place for the camels.”

The servant came into Bethuel’s household and dinner was served, but the servant would not eat until he explained his business. The servant was on a mission and the success of the mission was looking good, but he wasn’t home yet.

He was compelled to tell the story from the beginning—Abraham and Sarah having a son in their old age, the oath he took to bring Isaac a wife, the release from the oath if she would not come with him, and the fact that God was in this every step of the way.

He recounted how he had prayed and God had shown him Rebekah, just as he had petitioned.  He told of the gifts he gave to Rebekah and the praise he lifted up to the Lord.

As you read this, you might have thought, didn’t I just read this?  The answer would be yes, but the servant was not acting of his own will or authority but by the authority of his master, Abraham, who was fulfilling the will of God.

Bethuel and Laban said that all of this is from the Lord.  We don’t really have a say in it.  Take Rebekah and return to your master.

There were gifts galore given to Bethuel’s household.

The servant ate, drank, and spent the night, but by morning, the family was reconsidering the haste of their decision.  You might compare this to buyer’s remorse—a big decision followed by second thoughts. They wanted her to remain with them for 10 more days.

But the servant was on a mission from his master.  He had some momentum going. He didn’t want to take a break when things were going so well.  He needed to go and go now.

Instead of an impasse, the family asked Rebekah to decide.  She chose to go.  The family chose to send her with a blessing.

And they blessed Rebekah and said to her,

“Our sister, may you increase

    to thousands upon thousands;

may your offspring possess

    the cities of their enemies.”

It seems that the family embraced this Father of Many Nations blessing given to Abraham.  Rebekah was now to be a part of this.

And so, they headed back to Abraham. Rebekah was not without some means.  She had a nurse and some maidservants.  It’s a good thing that they unloaded the gifts for the family because Rebekah had some luggage.

I know the experience.  When we go on a cruise, I ask my wife the same question each time.  For how many people and how many months are you packing?

So here is the love story.  The caravan arrived near home.  Isaac was out in the fields in the evening time meditating. Rebekah asked the servant, who is that man?  He replied, that is my master.

Rebecca covered her face and the servant recounted the entire experience to Isaac. Isaac took Rebekah into the tent and made her his wife.  He loved her. She comforted him.

But what about the wedding invitations?  What about the feast?  What about the ceremony?  Was there even a priest around? What about premarital counseling?

Years ago, I was at Montana Mikes in Clinton.  A young couple recognized me as the pastor for the Burns Flat CPC.  They asked if I could do counseling before they got married.

I told them we should set up a time to talk and if it looked like some counseling was appropriate, we would set up a schedule.

They were disappointed.  They were hoping I could work it in between the appetizer and the main course.  I guess that would have been more counseling than Isaac had.

But Isaac was also on a mission from God.  He was part of this Father of Many Nations business.  Rebecca would be his wife.

Isaac brought her into the tent of his mother Sarah, and he married Rebekah.

Isaac was sad that he had lost his mother but comforted that he now had a wife. The Lord will provide. It wasn’t too long ago that Isaac was to be a sacrifice and burnt offering, but the Lord provided the sacrifice.  Now the Lord has provided a wife.

Abraham wouldn’t have much more time on this earth.  The story would shift to Isaac.

What should we take from this?

How about it’s good to have top-notch servants, wealth, and camels.  You never know when you might need to fetch a wife for your son.

Premarital counseling might be overrated.

Who needs wedding invitations and a select venue when mom’s tent is available for a right-now wedding.

 Maybe there is something else.  How about the Lord will provide.  Could you imagine being on a mission like the one Abraham gave his servant?

Find my son a wife.  This is the most important thing I have ever asked of you.  Swear to me you will get it right.

OBTW—the angel of the Lord will precede you.  There is a 100% difference between do this thing that is beyond comprehension and do it, the Lord is with you.

The servant had seen how the Lord had blessed his master.  The Lord provides!

How can I take the longest chapter that we have read so far and reduce it to the Lord provides?

Let’s go with this.  Know the story but know that the Lord provides.

The Lord provides.

Amen. 

God Knows Logistics

 Read Genesis 22

Let’s jump back to chapter 11 for a moment and do a little genealogy.

After Terah had lived 70 years, he became the father of Abram, Nahor and Haran.

Haran died.  Lot survived him.  Terah took him under his wing.  When Abraham was called by God to leave his father’s household in the area called Harran, Lot went with Abraham.

Up to this point, Nahor has been left out of the story. Now we see that he had kids.

Some time later Abraham was told, “Milkah is also a mother; she has borne sons to your brother Nahor: Uz the firstborn, Buz his brother, Kemuel (the father of Aram),  Kesed, Hazo, Pildash, Jidlaph and Bethuel.”  Bethuel became the father of Rebekah. Milkah bore these eight sons to Abraham’s brother Nahor.  His concubine, whose name was Reumah, also had sons: Tebah, Gaham, Tahash and Maakah.

You have to love those names.

The first time I went to Africa, I stayed with our host pastor in his home.  I have shared before that Rick and I each had a separate bed but we shared a towel.  I got one side.  He got the other.  We hung it in the room during the day and hoped it would dry by the next morning.  One day, Rick forgot to hang the towel so it would dry.  The next day was known as wet towel Thursday.

I won’t review the bathroom accommodations, but when we showed pictures, we went from 12 people interested in joining our return to Africa to – 12 people.  I’m not here to talk about that.

The pastor and his wife, who was also a pastor, had three children.  Two were girls—Angel and Blessing.  What would you expect when mom and dad were both pastors.

The couple had just had a baby boy.  They named him Bob. What’s in a name?

It’s a good thing that Abraham didn’t get this news about his brother’s kids before Isaac was born.  He would have really been discouraged.

It was a long time ago.  There was no Netflix or video on demand.  What did you do with time on your hands?  You made kids. If your wife already had a bun in the oven, you had a side chick—a concubine.

I’m interested to see if we had a Plandemic Lockdown Baby Boom in 2020 and 2021.  I think that Netflix and Prime subscriptions probably flattened that curve, but we will see.

Nahor had some sons.  It seemed that this Father of Many Nations business would have been easier with Abraham’s brother.

If you are named in the Bible, you are probably a guy.  That’s just the way the story was told.  Yes, there were women and the propagation of the species continued, but most women didn’t get any listing in the genealogies of the Bible.

There are two exceptions here.  One is Reumah the concubine.  Why is she mentioned?  She gave Nahor 4 sons.

And then there is Rebekah.  Why is she mentioned?

Abraham was 100 years old when he became a father to Isaac.  Abraham seemed to doubt this Father of Many Nations thing several times, but in today’s chapter, the other story is the faith of Abraham that God saw long before we saw it in the story.

Abraham didn’t really see beyond having this promised son.  Where would Isaac find a wife?  Hagar could just hop over to Egypt and get her son, Ishmael, a wife; but where would Isaac’s wife come from?

Later, we will see that Abraham did not want Isaac to take a wife from the people of Canaan. Even though Abraham’s father came out of Ur in the land of the Chaldeans—aka pagan country—there were still people that knew about God.  These people still had idols, but Abraham knew his son stood a better chance with the women of his father’s lineage than from the local population.

But Abraham had nothing to do with the logistics.

God rescued Lot from Sodom and Abraham had nothing to do with it. He probably thought that he was negotiating with God for the life of Lot’s family, but God had already put that rescue in place while Abraham was getting God down to sparing the city for the sake of 10 righteous men.

And God would provide wives for Abraham’s son and grandson.  God knows logistics.

The main message in this chapter is the really big faith that we finally get to see in Abraham in the first part of this chapter, but we should not neglect the fact that when God chooses us for something, he has already put the logistics in place that will equip and provision us.

Let’s trust more, obey more, and live more in accordance with our faith.  Yes, it’s okay to fear God more.

When God says he’s got this, he’s got this.

Trust, obey, believe, and fear nothing and no one but God.

Amen.