When Blessings Flow
Flowing Waterfall by Crystal A Murray
At Papa John’s Corporate Park in Louisville, Kentucky
So many things in life are linked together. I love in today’s reading from Genesis 24:53 through Genesis 24:67 how the original blessing for Isaac multiplied to bless more than just Isaac. I believe that all started with the servant who took the time to praise God and acknowledge Him as the provider of the blessing.
First, the servant was blessed. He blessed Rebecca with jewelry, clothing, and a promise of a good future. Then he also blessed Rebekah’s family with jewelry, clothing, livestock, etc. The family blessed the servant and the men he traveled with. Rebekah blessed her family. Her family sent her away with blessings like, “Our sister, may you be the mother of millions, and may your descendants possess the cities of those who hate them.” And when Isaac saw her as they arrived near his tent, it says he took her to be his wife, and it comforted him from the grief he was feeling over his mother’s death.
The Bible has so many promises of blessings from God, and they are all set to multiply. He gives to us with the purpose of our sharing it with others, but we have to see it and be thankful for it before we will be able to let go and share. Oh, but once we let God take over, it can go so far. It’s like the boy who gave the two fish and five loaves of bread in John 6:1-14. What started as a small offering that fit into a lunch box filled thousands and provided 12 baskets of leftovers after Jesus touched it. If we will remember that old hymn, Count Your Blessings, and sing it to ourselves often, we can lift God up in a way that He can multiply the blessings in our lives. Sing with me…
Count your blessings, name them one by one.
Count your blessings, see what God has done.
Count your blessings, name them one by one.
Count your many blessings, see what God has done.
May the blessings flow abundantly into and out of your life, and may you never become stagnate in receiving but always give as freely as you receive. Amen!
Promised Land Stake Out
Today’s section runs from Genesis 23:17 through Genesis 24:9 and begins with the purchase of land for Sarah’s burial. Apparently, burying his wife has reminded Abraham of his own mortality. He calls in his longest term (aka most faithful) servant and makes a request from him about the future of Isaac. I’m guessing Abraham has been praying about a wife for him because he tells the servant what steps to take and assures him that an angel will go before him to bless him in his efforts.
The servant takes an oath (signified by placing his hand under Abraham’s thigh, but I haven’t yet learned what that practice means) that he will do all Abraham asks. Mainly, Abraham wants to make sure that his son does not marry into the foreigners of the land where they dwell as strangers, but he also does not want his son to go back and live in their homeland. He is dependant on this faithful servant to go to Abraham’s birth land and find a wife to bring back to him.
If I were to tell the story in a modern way to make it easier for myself, I would say that Abraham is like a life-long American missionary that has been told to claim a particular land for God. That missionary might have a son that is marrying age, so he has someone go back to the states to find an American wife for his son. He doesn’t want his son to go back to America yet himself because they still have much work to do, and he wants his son to stay until the word of God to them has been fulfilled. Abraham said it this way in Chapter 24, verses 6 & 7, “See to it that you don’t bring my son back there. Adonai, the God of heaven — who took me away from my father’s house and away from the land I was born in, who spoke to me and swore to me, ‘I will give this land to your descendants’–he will send his angel ahead of you; and you are to bring a wife for my son from there.”
I imagine Abraham was still trusting God to fulfill the promise of giving that land to his descendants, so his descendant had to stay there until that was done. And maybe Abraham was even a little concerned that if Isaac went to visit another land, he might be enamored by something new and want to stay there rather than continue to stake out the place of promise. And I think this is a good thing for us to remember as well. Sometimes, it may seem like a long period of waiting to receive something God has promised us, but if we continue to have faith, trust God, and stake out the promise, it will be just as God has promised it will be. Bless God for ALL His promises and blessings!
When A Lie is Not A Lie
Stories like the one in today’s reading from Genesis 12:14 through Genesis 13:4 may be one of the reasons why our court system has testifiers agree to tell “the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.” In this story, Abram has decided that his wife Sarai’s beauty could cost him his life, so he falls back on the fact that she is his half-sister. He has her tell the Egyptians that she is Abram’s sister and conveniently leave out the part about her being married to him. They pay him handsomely for sharing his “sister” with them, and they don’t question it until plagues hit their household. Somehow, I guess the word has already gotten around that you don’t mess with the things of God Almighty because they knew what was causing their plagues, and they immediately released Sarai to Abram and sent them both safely on their way with many blessings.
For me, the idea of telling a half truth, even for a good cause, is difficult. I am honest to a fault, and I have to find a reason and a justification before I can agree to something like what was cooked up between Abram and Sarai. I actually felt bad for the Egyptians and what they had to go through as a result of this half-lie. But as I study it and other Scriptures, I can see that there are times when the “letter of the law” is less important than the “spirit of the law.” For example, if you tell someone that you have plans that don’t include celebrating their birthday because you actually want to surprise that person with a party, in the letter of the law, you’ve told a lie. But in the spirit of the law, you were not leaving out truth for the purpose of hurting someone, so it wasn’t truly a lie. For the Egyptians, if they truly served God Almighty, Abram wouldn’t even have had to fear they would take his life just to take his wife for themselves. If they served the True God, and if they were God-minded and not self-centered pleasure seekers, they would have known to pray about everything rather than just thinking they could take something simply because they desired it.
It’s not always easy to know when to lean on the spirit of the law over the letter, but there are a few other biblical examples of it…
In 1 Samuel 21, King David acts like he is insane.
In Joel 3:10, the weak are to say they are strong.
There’s even a story where a prophet has to get beaten to look like he has been attacked before arriving at a particular city.
All of these things point to the same issue–do not speak lies or truth with the purpose of hurting others. Search your heart and pray before you speak at all times. Commit your ways to God, and from there, He will establish your thoughts, and thereby your words. Walk in the spirit of the law, and you’re less likely to violate the letter of the law unless there is just no other way around it.
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Like Father, Like Son
We have another very short reading today. This one runs from Genesis 26:6 through Genesis 26:12; just seven verses. And in today’s story, we have almost a repeat of the story between Abraham and Sarah, only this time it is between Isaac and Rebekah.
So what is it with these guys who look for a loophole to saying they’re married for fear their women will be taken, and they (the husbands) will be put to death? Was that an Egyptian custom back then? If so, I haven’t learned about it yet, but it sure doesn’t sound like a nice one. Whatever it was, Isaac did exactly as his father did with King Abimelech and told people that his wife was his sister. And then, just as happened with Sarah, the King spotted the two of them together acting more like lovers than friends, and he knew.
After seeing them, Abimelech confronted Isaac with the possibility that he could have brought a curse on his entire kingdom if anyone had slept with Rebekah. Then, since Isaac advised him of why he did it, the king declared to the entire nation that they were not to touch Isaac or Rebekah, and that the penalty for doing so would be death. And once that was done, Isaac went about his work, and whatever crops he planted that year yielded him one-hundred fold. And, again like his father, Abraham, it says that God blessed him.
These shorter readings do make it a bit harder on me to come up with much commentary, but I’m wrestling a bit more tonight because my mind is thoroughly in fiction mode from writing my NaNo story. I’m wanting to stop and describe the scene here and everything. But I think you, my dear readers, understand the gist of this little story anyway. So I’m thankful you stopped by to see what’s happening in the progression of the Bible story, and I’m thankful to say I have also surpassed 6400 words in my novel efforts. We will visit again tomorrow when we see how Isaac deals with men who get jealous of God’s blessings on him. Bye for now and may God richly bless you and your children and beyond.
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November 3, 2013 Posted by Crystal A Murray (aka CrystalWriter) | Bible Study, Nonfiction, Torah Commentary | Abimelech, Abraham, Adonai, Almighty, Bible, Bible Gateway, Bible reading, Bible study, blessing, Complete Jewish Bible, Creator, crop, crystalwriter, curse, farm, father, fear of death, fib, Genesis, God, Holy Bible, Isaac, king, lie, like father like son, Lord, Old Covenant, Old Testament, one hundred percent, Parashah, planting, Portions, Rebekah, Rivkah, Sarah, Scripture, sister, son, The Complete Jewish Bible, Torah, Torah commentary, Torah Portions, Torah Reading, wife, Word, Word of God, Word of the Lord, www.biblegateway.com, Yahveh, Yahweh, yield, Yitzchak | Leave a comment