Seven Characteristics of Rebekah-Like Ladies

Introduction

Well, good morning. It is a wonderful, wonderful delight to be able to be here together with those of like precious faith, those who believe in Jesus, who have made a decision to be here this morning to focus on things of spirit and truth, to focus on the word of God. As was mentioned in the prayer at the very beginning by Chris, where he said in quoting Psalm 122 1, where the scriptures say, I was glad when they said unto me, let us go into the house of the Lord. It is truly a wonderful thing to be with God’s people. It makes me also think of what else he said that uh is reminiscent of 1 Corinthians chapter 3, verse 9. For we are God’s fellow workers.

You are God’s field, you are God’s building. We are the stones in God’s kingdom. We are the people of God’s God’s own family, and we are part together of the church. The church is the people of God. And it is a blessing to be here together this morning to worship in spirit and in truth. If you are visiting with us, you are our guests of honor, and we are glad that you have chosen to be working with us today by opening your Bibles and studying together from the Word of God. If you’re visiting, we’re so glad you’re here, and we hope you will find us to be a congregation that only teaches and preaches from the Word of God. And members, welcome back.

And I’ll invite you to also be thinking of what a preacher might title this lesson when you turn to Genesis 24. As you’re turning in your Bibles to Genesis 24, where we had our scripture reading from, we learn of the passage of Scripture that is called a bride for Isaac in many passages of Scripture. But my daughter’s name is Rebecca. So I didn’t title this sermon a bride like Rebecca. I just couldn’t do that. My daughter’s not even 13. I can’t go there. That’s way too early. But I can say for Rebecca and for all ladies here today, that we could title this lesson Seven Characteristics of Rebecca like Ladies. Rebecca is a very good character in the Bible. She is an Old Testament character that gives us many pieces of information into the insight of God’s people at the time of the patriarchs.

We often talk of the patriarchs and we talk of the men. We’re talking about Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. We talk about guys like Isaac, which we will talk about men towards the later portion of this morning’s lesson. So please be listening to some thoughts as you are hearing this lesson, and don’t think it’s only for the ladies. In fact, it’s very much a lesson for the fellas as well, as they pay attention to these characteristics of Rebecca like ladies. We look at Genesis 24, we see some characteristics of Isaac and how he meditated in the field at evening and how he listened and did not argue. He had some very good qualities. And so we want to focus on he as well in the discussion of this.

But first I want to mention that the patriarchs that we talk about, often in the Old Testament times, we sometimes over-emphasize the guy side and forget the lady side of those wonderful leaders who were from long, long ago. These patriarchs had wives or had women that were right beside them, helping them and encouraging them in their leadership. And Rebecca was one of those ladies that would be selected to be a bride for Isaac. It says, Abraham was old, Genesis 24, well advanced in age, and the Lord had blessed Abraham in all things. So Abraham said to the oldest, servant of his house, who ruled over all that he had, please put your hand under my thigh, and I’ll make you swear by the Lord, the God of heaven and the God of the earth, that you will not take a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites among whom I dwell.

1. Not Idolatrous

But you shall go to my country and to my family and take a wife for my son Isaac. What he’s basically saying is that I want you to find a lady that is not idolatrous.

That the lady who’s named Rebecca is not a Canaanite. She’s one of God’s people. Now we can make the case all we want, this way, that way, opinion, conviction, however you want to make the case, that maybe you should think a Christian should only marry a Christian. I think a Christian should marry someone who will help them get to heaven, and that puts God first, and that is focused on biblical things, because sometimes a Christian marries a weak Christian who falls away and drags them down and pulls them aside from the kingdom. Other times a Christian marries a very strong Christian. Other times a Christian marries someone who’s not a Christian yet, but is thinking, thinking, thinking, and then they become one. But in this particular case, he’s not saying any of that.

Christianity had not come about. But we do realize from the scriptures from 2 Corinthians, where it says, Be ye not unequally yoked. And it makes the case from that passage for us today that we need not to have a situation where we’re yoking ourselves up with someone. Listen carefully, young people, that would lead us into idolatry, because more times than not, it’s the weaker yoke that pulls the stronger. And it shouldn’t be that way. What it should be is that we are yoked with Jesus. And if we’re yoked with Jesus, the stronger is always pulling we the weaker. Because he says in Matthew, for my yoke is easy and my burden is light. Living life with Jesus yoked with you and having a yoke fellow of Jesus being with you through your journey is going to help you.

Nevertheless, when we look at Rebecca like lady, she wasn’t idolatrous. If you’ll skip through the passage all the way to verse 37 for just a moment, but then turning back with me if you will to verse 5, it says in verse 37 that uh when uh when it was told to the uh family of Rebecca that there was a need for a wife, it said that it was told that he had made a promise saying, You shall not take for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites in whose land I dwell, which is another point. A lot of people say, Well, should we just try to escape the world like the Amish and just try to live totally apart from our civilization and have no interaction with people in the world?

Of course not. But we need to recognize that our families and the family structure that we’re in needs to be as close to godliness and holiness as it can be. And over and over and over, God made the case throughout the scriptures, idolatry was sin, and idolatry would lead people astray. Today, if you are a lady and you’re thinking, well, that doesn’t really apply to me. No, idols do apply. Uh, for some people, Facebook is their idol. For some people, they cannot stop scrolling through Facebook. They just can’t. It has become their idol. For other people, it’s not Facebook, but it may be some TV program or some book series that has drawn them away from the focus of God. There are many people that could tell you more about many uh secular authors and books than even the Bible itself.

2. She Cared for Others and Their Property

And that when quizzed on basic Bible knowledge of where certain things are in the scriptures, those of faith, and I’m not saying those in this congregation, I’m saying those that have a faith in God come up lacking often. So please do not be idolatrous, but be righteous. Another characteristic of Rebecca like ladies is found in verses 15 through 17, which we have uh hinted at through our scripture reading. The bride for Isaac, Rebecca, was a young lady who dwelt in the region away from where Isaac was. In our modern day culture, you might say, Oh, well, why didn’t they go dating? They didn’t do that back then. The family selected essentially an arranged marriage situation for the other. And this Isaac was an older man, quite older.

He was not a teenager, he was not a twenty-something. And so they send the oldest servant, the very oldest servant with his wisdom to go select a bride for Isaac. Abraham had said in verse 8 that if the woman is not willing to follow you, then you will be released from this oath. Only do not take my son back there. So the servant put his hand under the thigh of Abraham, his master, and swore to him concerning the matter. Then the servant took of his master’s camels. Notice he travels with an entourage of animals as well as a number of things that he will gift to the lady. For all the master’s goods were in his hand, and he arose and went to Mesopotamia to the city of Nahor, and he made his camels kneel down outside the city by a well of water at evening time, the time when women go out to draw water.

Then he said, O Lord God of my master Abraham, please give me success this day and show kindness to my master Abraham. This is a family of prayer. This is a family where here’s a guy going far, far away. He’s a servant, and you could have said he’s nowhere near his master, but he still has faith in God. He still has belief in God. We read a passage of scripture in the New Testament where it says, For those of Caesar’s household greet you. Well, perhaps even those servants or those in the household of the Caesar, they would greet and think of spiritual things. Here in this context, prayer is the issue. That he’s saying that even this servant, this old servant is a man of prayer.

He says, Behold, here I stand by the well of water, verse 13, and the daughters of the men of the city are coming out to draw water. Now let it be that the young women to whom I say, please let down your pitcher, that I may drink. And she says, drink, and I will also give you your camels a drink. Let her be the one you have appointed for your servant Isaac. And by this I will know that you have shown kindness to my master. And it happened that, as we read on, it happened that Rebecca, who was born to Bethel, son of Milka, the wife of Nahor Abraham’s brother, came out with her pitcher on her shoulder, and the young woman was very beautiful. It’s important that it uses the context here that she’s beautiful, because later it would talk about where she veils her beauty before showing her presence before her future spouse.

I want you to remember that. That’s very important. It says, the young woman was very beautiful to behold a virgin, no man had known her, and she went down to the well, filled her pitcher, and came up. It doesn’t end there. It doesn’t say, here’s an old fellow. He’s got all these camels, and he says hi, he says hi, and he goes her merry way, takes her pitcher of water back to her family, Nahor, and he fills up his camels and goes on whatever business he’s there. She recognizes something that young ladies need to recognize today, and that is this. Those of age and those of long-lived life are to be respected, not laughed at, not mocked, not scoffed at, but respected. And here in this particular case, in the next few verses, it says, This lady cared about this fellow.

She saw this older person and cared for him. Look at verse 15 through 17. It says the young woman ran, uh ran, the servant ran to meet her at verse 17 and said, Please let me drink a little water from your pitcher. So she said, Drink, my lord. Then she quickly let down her pitcher to down to her hand and gave him a drink. Very tender way of making sure he got his water. This older man who’d been on a long journey. And when she had finished giving him a drink, she said, Okay, it’s very nice to see you. I hope you have a nice day, right? No. He said, Here you are on this long journey. You’ve got a retinue, that means a large number, of camels.

They’re here with you. Why don’t you let them drink till they’re full? So the camels, who I’m sure many of you, good Bible students and scholars have studied through the years, a camel can drink a lot. I’ll just make it plain. I’m not going to give the technical encyclopedic definition of a camel drink. But I am gonna say this a camel can probably drink more than a horse. And I’m used to standing by a water bucket with a with a hose, filling it up for the horse and watching it drink, drink, drink, drink, drink, and take the hose again, drink, drink, drink, drink, drink, made the hose up again, drink, drink, drink, drink, drink, and it’ll drink all that water. She didn’t have a hose. She had to reach down and draw the water out of the well and put forth the effort that it took, not only to help get water for this older individual, but also for all of his property.

Genesis 24, 19. She cared for the property. She cared for the camels. She cared for others. She wasn’t a Canaanite. And these three things he saw. He witnessed in her as a young lady that wasn’t just beautiful, wasn’t just what he said, this will make a beautiful wife, and she will just be just what he’s looking for. It will be a recognition of a principle that we will read in 1 Peter, where it talks about the gentle and quiet spirit that is precious in the sight of the Lord, the true inner beauty that is there in ladies that are God-fearing women. It said in this context that here in this passage of scripture, Rebecca didn’t just care about the way she looked. She cared for others, and she cared for others’ stuff and their things and their camels.

3. Selected by God

I’m sure you’re familiar with the Old Testament scripture in the book of Proverbs that makes it pretty clear where it says, For the wise man regardeth the life of his beast. She regarded the life of someone else’s beasts. She went one step further. She didn’t just, maybe she she maybe she had a camel that she came to the to the well at uh Nahor and Abraham. They weren’t poor people. They were both from both sides quite wealthy people. Maybe she had a camel and was taking this water pitcher back that way. We don’t know. But she cares for his stuff just as well as her own. Very important. But I think there’s a more vital part to this, and that’s that she was selected by God.

In Genesis 24, 26 through 27, we read of an important portion of scripture. It says in Genesis 24, 26 through 27, after that she had emptied the pitcher in the trough and ran back to the well to draw the water and drew for the camels, because obviously when you draw the water from down below with a rope, the camels aren’t going to drink from a little vessel, they’ll put it out on a trough and they’ll drink from the trough. And so the man wandering at her wondering at her remained silent so as to know whether the Lord had made his journey prosperous or not. So it was when the camels had finished drinking that the man took a golden nose ring weighing half a shekel and two bracelets for her wrist weighing ten shekels of gold, and said, Whose daughter are you?

Uh tell me, please, is there room in your father’s house for us to lodge? So she said unto him, I’m the daughter of Bethel, Milka’s son, whom she bore to Nahor. She’s not afraid to tell this guy who her family is. She got a good family. And he’s not, she’s not afraid to tell him. Moreover, she said to him, We have both straw and feed enough and room to lodge. We’ll get back to that in a moment. We’ll go back to verse 25, room to lodge. But she says, We have straw and feed enough and room to lodge. The man bowed down his head and worshiped the Lord. And he said, Bless. Blessed be the Lord, God of my master Abraham, who has not forsaken his mercy and truth toward my master.

As for me being on the way, the Lord led me to the house of my master’s kindred. He basically says, God led me right to where I needed to go, showed me the right one I needed to be finding, led me all the way of this very direct, there could not be a more succinct way that God could have said, if you want to find someone that’s not idolatrous, and if you want to be a servant of prayer, and your family wants to find someone that is going to follow after holiness, I’ll make sure that happens.

Now we have the Calvinist question, talking to the non Calvinist that says, Well, were they pre selected by God? Does God always choose some people here? Are some people always saved and some people always lost? And I just backtrack for a moment. When you look at election in the Bible, when God talks about selection and who God chooses, and who is God’s chosen, and who does he elect and who does he select? In the New Testament times, there is a sense of election. When you’re born, there’s an election. And what do we know that comes up around January in our nation? Election times of voting. When it comes to the voting principles of election, here’s how it works in New Testament scripture. I know we’re in the Old Testament, but in New Testament scripture, there’s three votes.

God’s got one vote for you. When you were born, when you uh uh begin your life, you have no sin. You’re innocent, you’re a little baby, you’ve got no sin. God votes for you. He goes, I want them to remain faithful. I want them to live their life for the Lord. Like Job, he says, Have you considered my servant Job? I’m counting on him. I have faith in man, if you will. So there’s one vote for you. The devil, Satan, he’s got his vote against you. And then you make the deciding vote. That’s election. In a nutshell, in the New Testament. That’s how you determine who’s the saved and who’s the called. God elects. God does elect. God does have an elect, but it’s those people that follow after him based on their free will choice.

So now we go back to this selection. What’s that? Providence. What’s providence? The idea that God can interweave his ways and his motions and his designs in the plight and condition of man. That when men pray, God can answer. When people pray to God for a situation to transpire and become something that develops, God can find a way for it to work. There is a selection by God. There is providence of God. I do not deny providence. I affirm it to a great degree. And here in this passage of scripture, God is showing I will find a way for my plan to work. No matter what, God will make sure his plan works. If it doesn’t work through me, it’ll work through somebody else. If it doesn’t work through you, it’ll work through somebody else.

God will find a way for his plan to work. And it didn’t work. It did work successfully. And here we see a lady who’s selected by God. Ultimately.

4. She Ran to Hospitality

I said we’d go back to that verse where it says, back in 25, she said to him, We’ve got room, we’ve got straw, we’ve got feed enough for you to lodge. This sounds like just welcoming, just beaming with the smile of a welcoming heart. And then you look at this verse in 28 where the young woman ran and told her mother’s household these things. That here is a man from far, far away, a relative of a distant nature of a distant place coming to do business in a local place, and she’s running to her mother’s household to tell her these things.

So we’re looking at someone who’s not a Canaanite, one who cares for others, one who cares for property, one who was a selected one by God, and one that ran to hospitality. Ladies, this is something we can apply today as well.

Look at the passages of scripture there. One of those things is that the Christian is supposed to be given to hospitality. That’s the phrase within the long listing of things there mentioned in that passage.

You know, this lesson kind of fits with our theme, whether you’ve noticed it or not. Transformation. This lady, at her phase of life, where she was, was about ready to have one of the most transformative moments. To go from being in her family household, living under the shelter of Nahor and his family, being very closely associated with the people that she knew and loved and grew up with, and then getting ready to make a conscious, willful decision. Remember, she could have said no, I don’t want to go.

5. A Family That Respects God; Bravery

But the fellows, even the fellow who went as a servant to take her on the journey was going to be released from his oath if she had said no. So she has an out. She has a way, she doesn’t have to go. But she’s about to make a crucial moment decision in her life, and that is, shall she go on this journey to become the bride for Isaac? Without seeing Isaac, without knowing who he is. And yet at the same time, when you see these principles that are in her life, you see a number of things that deal with a respect for God. Look at verse 50. A crucial verse in the context. When you look at the passage of scripture, we’re going to read a little bit just to give a little more portion here.

All these bracelets and such, jewelry, um, various things. And verse 31 says, he says, Come, O blessed to the Lord, why do you stand outside? I’ve prepared the house in a place for the camels. The men came to the house and unloaded the camels and provided straw and feed for the camels and water to wash his feet and the feet of the men who were with him. Verse 32. Food was set before him to eat, but he said, I will not eat. I will not eat until I’ve told you about my errand. He come from a long journey. And he’s saying, Forget lunch, remember God. That’s his nutshell sermon in one verse. God sent me on a mission, and I am not going to negate the mission.

He said, Okay, speak on. So he said, I am Abraham’s servant. The Lord has blessed my master greatly, and he has become great. He has given him flocks and herds, silver and gold, male and female servants and camels and donkeys. He’s basically saying, There are provisions. Verse 36, he said, Sarah, my master’s wife bore a son to my master when she was old, and to him he has given all that he has. Now my master made me swear, saying, You shall not take a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites in whose land I dwell, but you shall go to my kindred and take a wife for my son. And I said to my master, Perhaps, perhaps the woman will not follow me.

But he said to me, The Lord before whom I walk will send his angel with you, and prosper your way, and you shall take a wife for my son from my family and from my father’s house. You’ll be clear from this oath when you arrive among my family, for if they will not give her to you, then you will be released from your oath. And this day I came to the well and said, O Lord my God, God of Master Abraham, if you will now prosper the way in which I go, behold, I stand by the well of water, and it shall come to pass that when the virgin comes out to draw water, and I say to her, please give me a little water from your pitcher to drink.

And she says to me, drink and I will draw for your camels also. Let her be the woman whom the Lord has appointed for my master’s son. But before I had finished speaking in my heart, I love that. God knows this guy’s heart. Before I had finished speaking in my heart, there was Rebecca coming out with her pitcher on her shoulder, and she went down to the well and drew water, and I said to her, Please let me drink. And she made haste. She made haste, that means she went very quickly, and let her pitcher down from her shoulder and said, Drink, and I’ll give your camels drink also. So I drank, she gave the camels a drink, and I asked her, saying, Whose daughter are you?

And the story is repeated. Verse 48, I bowed my head and worship the Lord and blessed the Lord, the God of my master, who had led me in the way of truth to take the daughter of my master’s brother for his son. Now, if you will deal kindly and truly with my master, tell me, and if not, tell me that I may turn to the right hand or to the left. And Laban looks at him, he says, I can’t tell you anything. I’m not going to tell you what to do. This is of the Lord. If the Lord has led you this way, and everything you said has been just the way that is, the Lord is going to make this decision. If he says yes, we say yes.

If she says no and he says no, the Lord and her, we’re not going to call it off. They’re looking very carefully to the ways of the Lord. The family on both ends respects God. Young people, value that. Young people, young ladies, young fellows, when you focus on making a decision as to who you might want to be married to someday, focus very carefully on if your family and their family respects God. It’ll be a challenge if they don’t. Remember that. Next part. The fun part of the lesson, but the scary part at the same time. Bravery. You know what the lady says? Let’s talk a little bit about Isaac. I want how tall is he? I know he’s got money. How tall is he? What is he like to do?

What are his common interests? No. He says, I’ll go. Now, granted, there may have been some dialogue that we’re not privy to. I get that. But she says, I’ll go. I’ll leave my family. I’ll not wait six years. I’ll go. Look at verse 58. I’ll go on this mission. I’m brave. I’m brave. Rebecca, like ladies, need to be brave, but I’ll tell you there’s more to the story, fellas. Young men, what do you seek? When you are looking for a wife and you’re looking for someone to spend your life with, are you looking for someone who is only cared about appearances or someone who cares for others? It’s important to make your decisions on whom you care about based upon the wisdom of those people in your family.

And I valued those. I put a lot of stock in that. Put a lot of credibility in the wisdom of those older. Now, granted, it wasn’t an arranged marriage, but it was a marriage that before we got married, Rachel and I did talk to one another’s parents and such. And so we learned of the family situation in those situations. And it’s important, young people to do that. The characteristics of bravery are something that we need today. But not just bravery to go get married and make that decision to do so, but to not feel you have to be pressured by the world’s standards to behave and conform to the world. What does Romans teach us? Be ye not conformed to this world, but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind that you might prove what is that good and acceptable way inside of the Lord.

Transform your mind to think in these kinds of ways. If you’re not being hospitable or not being the type of person that wants to have anything to do with others, well, work on that. If you’re the type of lady that from time to time says, well, I don’t really care about the aged, start learning of the aged. You can learn what it says in the book of Timothy and Titus that the older women are to teach the younger women. They’re to teach them to be uh hospitable, lovers of good, lovers of their children, lovers of their husband, uh, thinking on those things. But here’s the reality there’s a lot of older women that would teach that if the younger women would come to them and ask them those questions and seek the learning information that’s needed to get that blending together of the older wisdom onto the younger wisdom.

6. For the Men: Meditating; She Veils Herself

That’s all I’m saying. So we look at those principles and we can be brave in those ways. But now for the men. In verse 63, Isaac’s out in the field meditating. He could have been doing a whole lot of other things. He’s about 40 years old. He’d be doing whatever he wanted to do, but he’s not. He’s meditating and thinking about spiritual Bible passages. You say, what ones is he thinking of? Whatever came before this passage up to Genesis 20, that wasn’t even revealed by the written pen. It was whatever God had spoken to Abraham, passed down through Aurel spoken tradition unto him that he gained that wisdom. It wasn’t as if he’s turning to the book of Job and reading from it. He’s got these wisdom points from God that he’s meditating on through the out, meditating about in the field.

He’s out there in the middle of his field thinking about biblical things. Young men, that’s what we need to be doing. We don’t need to be out in the field thinking on idolatrous things or non-hospitable things or non-caring for the aged things. We need to be thinking about spiritual things. And so was Rebecca. Isaac and Rebecca were like that. 2463, he was meditating in the field. He was also listening. And in verse 67, you can see the love he would have for Rebecca. I told you I’d talk a little bit about one verse that’s mentioned in the passage of Scripture in Genesis 24. And it says in verse 16 that the young woman, that’d be Rebecca, was very beautiful to behold. But yet later, when she gets all the way to the place where she’s about to meet her future husband, and granted it’s going to be her husband, but she’s about to meet him.

That it says that when she gets there, look in verse uh 63. The Isaac went out to meditate in the field in the evening, and he lifted his eyes and looked, and there the camels were coming. Then Rebecca lifted her eyes, and when she saw Isaac, so he’s close enough to see, she dismounted. That means she got off the camel, dismounted from her camel, for she had said to her servant, Who is this man walking in the field to meet us? The servant said, It is my master. So she took a veil and covered herself. I know no other way of saying this lady. But here’s the lady that’s literally about to get married and is still showing forth respect for her person, herself, who she is, and is being modest.

The society we live in today is grossly immodest. It flaunts the body with so much fervor that it’s utterly distracting to anyone.

You can go take a walk with your dog down the road, and you’re going, This person could have put on more clothes. You can go to school and try to focus, young men, on your on your task at hand, and someone walks across the way and your eyes are distracted. And if you’re dating someone that you want to be modest, and you’re trying to be holy and you’re trying to be good, then your neck’s like this the whole time, trying to look at their eyes and going like this, trying not to look in different directions, and they’re going, What’s wrong with you? And you’re thinking in your mind, what’s wrong with you? I’m serious. You call it taco neck. You’re going like this, change your neck, blue too.

Seriously. It’s difficult, young men and young ladies. Don’t make it more difficult on the fellas. Make it a little easier for them. If you’re a lady and you’re beautiful, they know it, and you don’t have to show it. They know it. Okay. That’s my two cents. Got on my soapbox for a little bit, stepped on the toes. I know, don’t care. That’s my job. So listen, ladies, make it easier on them. Here she veils herself. The time of the ancient Near Eastern customs that this was going on was a full veil, not just something that covered the portion of their ears. It wasn’t that. It was a full veil covered a body. That’s the point. They still do that today in some cultures. The point I’m trying to make is before marriage, he covered herself.

What did it say in Genesis? That when Adam and Eve were just Adam and Eve in the garden, they’re they’re naked and unashamed. That’s fine. It’s only Adam and Eve. But when sin came in the camp, what happened? They sewed for themselves what? Big leaves to cover themselves, and that wasn’t enough. So God made for them the death of animals to cover for more of their body to make the case for the for the situation there that it needed to be more modest than what they had initially thought of. So, ladies, if you’re thinking, is this modest enough? Go one step further and make it even more modest than what you’re asking. Is it modest enough? Cover it. That’s that. So, young men, what do you see?

Hopefully, a lady who’s got the qualities like Rebecca. And I want to read verse 67. I love this. The servant told Isaac all the things that he had done. Do you think in the passage of scripture in verse 66 that the servant told Isaac, you’re gonna have a beautiful wife? I do. And I think I know why. Because her beauty was from within. And I think he did tell Isaac, you’re gonna have a very beautiful wife. Because this is a lady whose beauty is going to go beyond the superficial years where that beauty may only be perceived by some people in the Canaanite world as something that’s an outer appearance, and then they’ll go get some other wife because the Canaanites would have done that, but the Israelites would not.

Conclusion

Their beauty would continue on because they remembered the precious in the sight of the Lord is the beauty from within. And he knew that. Isaac brought her into his mother Sarah’s tent, and he took Rebecca and she became his wife, and he loved her. So Isaac was comforted after his mother’s death. Important lesson. Maybe you’ve not thought of from this perspective before. This lesson has not been designed to teach what one must do to be saved or how to become a Christian. It’s not had that design. But it has had importance for us in the society in which we live in, so much so that its message is needed maybe more now than then. Don’t know. The world isn’t growing wiser, the world isn’t growing purer, the world isn’t growing more and more close to God.

It’s getting more corrupt and more defiled and more estranged from the holiness that’s within the Word of God. So what can you do? You can shine as a light in the world, and you can be the example that’s like a Rebecca, or that’s like an Isaac, and shining forth the example that you can do in this generation what they did in theirs. Although far removed from both cultures, the principles remain. Jesus is calling for you today. We mentioned that election. We mentioned that calling. God’s got a vote on your side. When you were born, he voted for you. He said, This is the one I want to be saved. The devil, once we become of the age of accountability, says, Ah, I’m gonna get them to sin.

I’m gonna work my little uh devices with them, and I won’t cause them to sin, but I’ll present sin in front of them to where they’ll eventually sin. And it’s our portion and it’s our design to get back in the good graces of God by hearing his gospel, Romans 10.17, by believing Jesus is the Son of God and believing who he is, and that you may have life in his name, by saying, I believe in His Majesty Jesus, Romans 10.10, by stopping that life of sin, Acts 2.37 and 38, and by having your sins washed away. For he says in Acts 2 38, repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of sins, and you shall receive the gift of the Spirit.

For the promise is to you and to those who are afar off, as many as the Lord our God will call. If we can help you do that this morning, please come forward while we stand and sing.