Eve, Sarah and Rebekah: September 2019
Table of Contents
Eve, Sarah and Rebekah
Marriage was instituted in the Garden of Eden, and it vividly displays the nearness of relationship into which believers are to be brought, as the church and bride of Christ, to Himself. Moreover, the familiarity of our minds with this relationship makes us understand better the place to which we are brought in the gracious affections of Christ. Everything around the Christian, in this world, serves to illustrate what this blessed relationship is between Christ and the church.
Eve was to Adam the companion of his home and the object of his affections. So “Christ loved the church, and gave Himself for it,” and the fact that she becomes the object and witness of His affections is a thought more deeply touching than all the glory which will be her endowment as the bride of Christ. The purpose of Christ’s ministry toward His church is “that He might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word,” and the end of that ministry is “that He might present it to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle, or any such thing.” Just as Eve was for Adam himself, so is the church to be for Christ Himself.
Like Eve, Sarah and Rebekah are beautiful examples to us. Sarah was a woman of faith and of submission. Rebekah illustrates for us God the Father providing a heavenly bride for His Son when He, the Son of God, became a man.
Present Testimony, Vol. 7 (adapted)
Eve
In Genesis 2, we have the first Adam as a figure of Him that was to come. God placed him in paradise, the Garden of Eden. And the Lord God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him.” How wonderfully this reveals the thought of God in eternity: His purpose that the last Adam, now in the paradise of God, should not be alone. We then see how God formed the creatures, brought them unto Adam, and Adam gave them their names. But there was not a help-meet for him in paradise—not one of the same nature that corresponded to him. The animals were with him in paradise, companions we may say, but no creature suitable to be ONE with Adam.
Note, this was absolutely the case until “the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and He slept: and He took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof; and the rib, which the Lord God had taken from man, made He a woman, and brought her unto the man.” We could not have seen this hidden type of Christ and the church, if the Holy Spirit had not revealed it in Ephesians 5:30. Now all is clear.
There was no Eve until Adam had been laid in the figure of death: the deep sleep. Until then he was alone, though in the midst of all creation. The Lord Jesus tells us the very same thing: Speaking of Himself, He says, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit” (John 12:24). He was there with His disciples, or in heaven in the midst of angelic hosts, but as to His nature, He was and must be forever alone, unless He were to die and be raised from the dead.
Bone of His Bone
The moment Eve saw Adam, she was like him, bone of his bone, flesh of his flesh. It will be so with the second Eve, the one Bride of Christ: When she shall be presented to Him, she will be glorious; the moment we see Him, we shall be like Him (Eph. 5:26; 1 John 3:2). There was no Eve until Adam in figure died and rose again. Then she corresponded perfectly to Adam and was part of himself. And the New Testament carries all this out fully as to the church, the bride of Christ. To faith, all is now sure, but the presentation in the perfect likeness of Christ has not yet come. Surely all this should prepare us to find something marvelously new and different when Christ, the last Adam, had died and had risen from the dead. And that something is new; that new creation is the church of God, one with Christ, the Head in heaven. “Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.” Thus was Eve meet to be Adam’s companion and a help-meet in the paradise of Eden. And all this was the work of God, according to His own purpose.
The Paradise of God
And is it so, are all believers, according to the purpose of God, made meet for the paradise of God? Yes, we can all give “thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light” (Col. 1:12). As this is the first figure of the church, it is well to note how all is of God, answering to Ephesians 1-2.
Just as Eve was one with Adam, blessed in and with him with every blessing in the earthly paradise, so now of all the saints of God: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ; according as He hath chosen us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love” (Eph. 1:3-4). But all is of God. Did God raise Adam from his deep sleep? Then, “what is the exceeding greatness of His power to us-ward, who believe, according to the working of His mighty power, which He wrought in Christ when He raised Him from the dead, and set Him at His own right hand in the heavenly places ... and hath put all things under His feet, and gave Him to be the head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him that filleth all in all” (Eph. 1:19-23).
Heavenly Places
And then the same blessed God has raised us up from the dead: “Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ (by grace ye are saved), and hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus” (Eph. 2:5-6).
Yes, the first thought of God in giving His Son was that He might not remain alone, the Man in the glory of the heavenly paradise, but that He should have a bride, the church, in His own perfect likeness. Sins and sin forever passed away, she should share in His glory forever with and like Him — having His own sinless perfection, His own very nature. Oh, what will it be to be the companion of the last Adam in eternal glory, in every way corresponding to Him, as Eve to Adam! No other creature in the universe is to have or can have this place.
C. Stanley (adapted)
Eve's Faith
When Eve is mentioned in Christian circles, it is rather common to find her name associated with her act of listening to Satan in a serpent’s form and then being tempted to distrust God and believe a lie. Doubtless this was true, for it was Eve who was deceived by the devil, not Adam. It was she who first looked on the forbidden fruit, noting that it was “good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise” (Gen. 3:6). It was she who first ate of it and then gave it to her husband. In all of this she must bear her share of the blame for the havoc that has resulted, and the subsequent pain pronounced on her by the Lord reflects this. Thousands of years later, Paul could remind the Corinthians of Satan’s subtlety and warn them of how he had deceived Eve. It might be easy for us to point the finger at Eve for being taken in by Satan, but who of us has not also been deceived by Satan’s subtlety?
The Lord’s Promise
However, it is important also to take note of the fact that she was indeed a woman of faith, in spite of her failure. Before the Lord pronounced the consequences on both Eve and Adam for their sin, He not only laid a curse on the serpent, but also stated the eventual victory of the Seed of the woman over him. At first, it might seem as if Satan would be victorious, for not only had he succeeded in bringing sin into the world, with sorrow and death, but the Lord predicted that he would bruise the heel of the Seed of the woman. No doubt this came to pass at the cross, but before the Lord mentions this, He states that “It [the Seed of the woman] shall bruise [or crush] thy head” (Gen. 3:15). The Seed of the woman, which is Christ, is clearly identified as such in Galatians 3:16: “To thy Seed, which is Christ.” This, of course, was said to Abraham, from whose family Christ, as a man, would arise. God will have the victory in Christ, when the serpent’s head is finally crushed and he is cast into the lake of fire (Rev. 20:10). This is brought out first, before even the declaration that the serpent would bruise the heel of the Seed of the woman and before the consequences of their sins were pronounced on Eve and Adam.
It seems that Eve, along with Adam, fully laid hold of this clear statement, and by faith they went on with God, even in an earth that would, from that point on, be characterized by sin, disease, distress and death. Adam, in a world of death, could so count on God that he called his wife Eve “the mother of all living” (Gen. 3:20). Eve, on her part, also believed that God would fulfill His Word to them in providing a Redeemer through her, and when Cain was born, she could say, “I have gotten a man from the Lord” (Gen. 4:1). But she was to reap sorrow and heartache from this firstborn son, for “the first man is of the earth, earthy” (1 Cor. 15:47), and he was to demonstrate both the violence and corruption that sin had brought into the world. It remained for a second son, Abel, to display what was pleasing to God, for “the second man is the Lord from heaven” (1 Cor. 15:47).
The Lord’s Reward
We do not read much more about Eve, for her name is mentioned only four times in the Word of God. Yet it is important to recognize that her faith was real, and the Lord rewarded it, even in her lifetime. She did not see the real Seed that would crush the serpent’s head, but her third son, Seth, was a man of God, and Eve again recognized that the Lord had given him to her instead of Abel, whom Cain had killed. And when Seth in turn had a son, Enos (meaning man in his weakness and mortality), we have the encouraging word, “Then began men to call upon the name of the Lord” (Gen. 4:26). It would seem that Seth, in the middle of a world system that his brother Cain had created, recognized what man had become as a result of sin, and he began to call upon the name of the Lord. Thus began the family of faith — a family that eventually produced Noah and then the Abrahamic line. We are not told how old Eve lived, but there is every reason to believe that she lived a long life, as did her husband and others of that era. We know that Adam lived for 800 years after the birth of Seth, and he “begat sons and daughters” (Gen. 5:4). She would, no doubt, have seen her grandson Enos born and experienced the joy of seeing her family call upon the name of the Lord.
W. J. Prost
Sarah
Sarah was a remarkable woman. We can profit by considering the growth of her soul as taught by God.
The first time that she acts independently is recorded in Genesis 16, when, too impatient to await the fulfillment of God’s promise to Abraham that they should have an heir and evidently faithless with regard to it, she suggests to her husband that he should take her Egyptian maid to be his wife. We are told in Galatians 4:24-25 that Hagar represents the covenant made on Mount Sinai, and this speaks to us of bondage. Abraham yields to Sarah’s suggestion, and faith for the time gives place to nature. Nature finds its resources and even its religion in things down here quite apart from God, in contrast to faith which makes God, who is the Source of its very existence in a soul, the center of everything.
Is Sarah alone in this phase of unbelief? If we challenge our own hearts, how often must we plead guilty to the temptation of seeking some relief from pressure or some way out of a difficulty, by having recourse to this world and to seeking its means to meet our needs! What a slight upon the God who has given us so many proofs of His love, faithfulness and wisdom! If we know Him in any measure, we are without excuse. Sarah had not the full revelation that has been made known to us, and it does not appear from the text that she was even present when the promise was made to Abraham. Thus she missed the faith-inspiring object lesson of the star-spangled heavens and the deep, solemn teaching of the night’s watch by the sacrifice (see Genesis 15:4-18). Her sad act of unbelief, however, cannot fail to bring sorrow and discord, and this soon becomes evident.
The Trial of Hagar
Sarah is despised by Hagar, and Sarah responds with harshness, so that Hagar flees. But she is not allowed to remain away. Sarah has lessons to learn through Hagar’s presence in her home, so God, who is just as interested in Sarah’s spiritual growth as in Abraham’s, sends her back. It must have been a trial to Sarah when Ishmael was born and a test during the 14 years he and his mother remained in the home. But Sarah was doubtless in the school of God all this time, for we do not read of any more quarrels, although she laughed in derision through unbelief when the heavenly strangers reiterated God’s promise, giving all the full details connected with it (see Genesis 18). How loath we are to believe divine statements when they are contrary to nature, forgetting that “with God all things are possible.” When faith is not in exercise in a believer, there is something in him that is hindering, because there are no hindrances on God’s side. How aptly does Eliphaz put the question to Job: “Are the consolations of God small with thee? Is there any secret thing with thee?” (Job 15:11). I think we shall find that this was the case with Sarah. On two occasions she and her husband acted in a deceitful manner, so that, though knowing more of God and taking a higher ground than those around them, they are reproached and reproved by them. Let us beware, as Christians, of giving occasion to those about us to blaspheme the name of Christ.
Secret Arrangements
Abraham’s excuse for their behavior to Abimelech in Genesis 20:11-14 tells of a secret arrangement made between Sarah and himself when he first responded to God’s call. In spite of a fuller revelation of God to them as time went on, they still harbored this evil thing and had recourse to it, and of this we have a twofold account (see chapters 12 and 20). How soul-deadening! No wonder that their faith is fettered! Let us carefully avoid being deceitful, always seeking to live transparently before God and man, for it is the only path in which fruit can be borne to Him and blessing can accrue to us.
Faith and Hope
But now let us pass on to a brighter picture. In Hebrews 11:11 we read, “Through faith also Sara herself received strength ... and was delivered of a child ... because she judged Him faithful who had promised.” We are not told how God worked in her soul to accomplish this marvelous change, but her faith and hope is now entirely and firmly placed in Him, and she trusts Him implicitly. She has, at last, come to the end of herself and has discovered her own utter weakness. When she was acting for herself, everything went wrong and only brought bitter disappointment. God must undertake everything for her if His promise is to be made good in her, and “she judged Him faithful who had promised.”
When we reach this point and leave self out of the question, there is no longer any hindrance to our progress in God’s things, because the wisdom of the One who has our training in hand is infinite, and “who teacheth like Him?” (Job 36:22).
Laughter
God’s promise is fulfilled, and Isaac, the child so long waited for, is born. Sarah now seems almost to outshine Abraham. He names the child at God’s direction (see Genesis 17:19), but Sarah shows intelligence and interprets it. She seems to recognize what springs of refreshment and joy she has in Isaac, for she says, “God hath made me to laugh, so that all that hear will laugh with me” (Gen. 21:6). What a contrast to her laugh of unbelief behind the tent door! This is the pure laugh of the deep joy of fulfilled desire and faith in God, and it bears its testimony. It is a case of “my cup runneth over.”
Do we know anything of this joy in a spiritual sense? We all know that Isaac is a very distinct type of Christ. Is our appreciation of Him so great that He has become the source of a deep joy that no one can deprive us of, and that, bubbling up and over, ministers refreshment to those about us and becomes the source of true fellowship? Sarah says, “All that hear will laugh with me.”
Sarah goes one step further. She now has faith in God, an awakened and intelligent heart that can fully appreciate Isaac, but he must be supreme. He must have no rivals. Now is the time for decision, and Sarah is ready for it. “Cast out this bondwoman and her son” is the advice she gives Abraham, and Ishmael has to go. There is no place for the flesh when faith is in activity and Christ is truly appreciated. God has put a wonderful seal to this decision of Sarah’s and honored it in a very special way. In Galatians 4:30 we read, “What saith the scripture? Cast out the bondwoman.” Sarah’s actual words are quoted, and God deigns to call them “Scripture,” clearly showing that she had His mind in her decision and that her action met His approval.
May we each imitate Sarah and seek that Christ shall have the supreme place in our hearts.
Author unknown
Through Faith Also Sarah
As to the dispensation in which he lived, Abraham’s proper outlook was similar to that of the believer today, although, of course, without the knowledge or possession of any of the blessings which are ours in Christianity. In Abraham’s day, as in our day of grace, God was not laying claim to this world in an outward way; rather, He was calling out of it those who would walk before Him in a pilgrim character, giving up present advantage for future gain. As such, his faith was exemplary and his conduct typical of those who were “strangers and pilgrims on the earth” (Heb. 11:13). He followed the call of God in leaving Ur of the Chaldees, and as it is recorded, “he went out, not knowing whither he went” (Heb. 11:8). In putting ourselves into his circumstances, we realize that it must have been a real test of his faith at the beginning, to leave a relatively well-developed city of that day and to go out to live a pastoral life in a land populated by a people whom he did not know and who were also wicked in their beliefs and behavior. Yet he was obedient to the call of God, and his faith has served as an example to all who followed him in their belief in God and His Word. “They which be of faith are blessed with faithful Abraham” (Gal. 3:9).
Not of This World
The world of today, in its character and behavior, is much the same as that in which Abraham lived. Those of us who live in areas where the gospel has been preached for many years and where Christianity is well-known can be thankful for this heritage. Yet it remains that, for the believer, “in the world ye shall have tribulation” (John 16:33). Also, in praying to His Father for His own, our Lord could say, “They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world” (John 17:14). Many dear believers, all down through the ages, have had to face the opposition of their families, neighbors and the world around them, enduring persecution and even martyrdom for their faith. This is going on today in many places in this world, and even in Western countries, opposition to Christianity and Christian principles is growing. The world that rejected the Lord Jesus nearly 2,000 years ago has not changed in its outlook.
United Together
In the midst of all that Abraham was called upon to go through in his life before the Lord, it is beautiful and encouraging to see that God provided a help-meet for him—one who shared His faith and who was happy to follow him in his life as a pilgrim and a stranger. It is true that there was failure in her life, as there was with Abraham, for when she was not able to have a child in the natural way, it was Sarah who proposed giving her maid Hagar to Abraham as his wife, that they might have a child by her. When the Lord Himself, with two angels, visited Abraham’s home (Gen. 18), it is true that initially Sarah laughed in unbelief, when she heard the prophecy of the Lord concerning the son that she would bear. However, she acted with her husband in showing hospitality to the strangers who had come to visit their home, and as we read in Hebrews 13:2, she “thereby ... entertained angels unawares.” We learn from Hebrews 11:11 that she then “through faith ... received strength to conceive seed ... when she was past age, because she judged Him faithful who had promised.” Later, when it was the mind of the Lord to send Hagar and Ishmael away from the household, it was Sarah who was more in the current of God’s thoughts than her husband, Abraham, and the Lord told him to “hearken unto her voice” (Gen. 21:12). In all these things we find a woman who lived in the current of God’s thoughts, as did her husband Abraham.
Submission
More than this, Peter comments on her submission to her husband, recording that “Sara obeyed Abraham, calling him lord” (1 Peter 3:6). Since Sara was actually Abraham’s half-sister, it would have been easy, in a natural way, for her to consider Abraham more of a brother than a husband, but she recognized the behavior that was proper to the relationship into which she had entered, and she acted accordingly. Also, it is interesting that in connection with Sarah, Peter goes on to say, “Whose children ye have become, doing good, and not fearing with any kind of consternation” (1 Peter 3:6 JND). As we have already commented, the world around Abraham and Sarah was wicked, and God would eventually use the nation of Israel to drive them out of the land because of their extreme iniquity. It might have been tempting for Sarah to fall in with their evil ways, as it is a temptation for Christian women of today to adopt the thinking and lifestyle of the world around them. But Sarah evidently was of the same mind as Abraham, in that she looked beyond this present world and sought “a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God” (Heb. 11:10). Peter, in his turn, warns us not to be afraid to obey the Lord and to walk before Him, doing what is right and not fearing the consequences.
A Companion
The history of Abraham and Sarah ought to be an encouragement for us today, in that when God called him to leave his home country and to walk before Him as a pilgrim and a stranger, He provided a companion to share his life and to walk with him. Surely the Lord is able to do the same thing today and to provide a life-partner with whom we can walk with the Lord and serve Him. We too are surrounded by a hostile world, and one that is quickly becoming worse. Yet God’s Word remains the same, and He is able, not only to make a clean path for us, but to provide a spouse who also wants to please Him.
In saying this, we are not suggesting that the Lord will always provide a wife or a husband simply because that is what we want. No, God has His own ways with each one of His children, and He does not always give us that which we think we need. But we do have the assurance that “no good thing will He withhold from them that walk uprightly” (Psa. 84:11). In trusting the Lord, as Abraham and Sarah did, we too can have the assurance that He will provide for us in the best possible way, for His glory and also for our blessing.
W. J. Prost
The Death of Sarah
In Genesis 23 another instructive event opens on us. It is not the death of Hagar, who sets forth the Sinaitic or legal covenant: We might have expected some such typical matter and could all understand that. But the marvel is that, after the figure of the son Isaac led as a sacrifice to Mount Moriah but raised from it (a type of the death and resurrection of Christ), we have the death of Sarah. She is the one who represents the new covenant with Israel, not of the law but of grace. And what is the meaning of that type, and where does it find its answer in the dealings of God when we think of the fulfillment of the type? It is certain and also plain. In the Acts of the Apostles, not to speak of any other scripture, the true key is placed in our hands. When the Apostle Peter stood before the men of Israel and bore witness of the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus, the true Isaac, what did he tell them? This — that if they were willing by grace to repent and be converted, God would assuredly bring in those times of refreshing of which He had spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets since the world began (Acts 3:19-21). He added that they were the children, not only of the prophets but of the covenant which God made with the fathers, saying unto Abraham, “In thy seed shall all the kindreds of the earth be blessed.”
There we have the required solution. Peter presented after this the readiness of God to bring in the blessedness of the new covenant, if they, by grace, bowed their stiff neck to the Lord Jesus. But they would not hearken: They rejected the testimony and finally put to death one of the brightest witnesses, in the person of Stephen. In point of fact, the unbelief was complete to the rejection of the testimony of the Holy Spirit founded on the death and resurrection of Christ, and, in consequence, that presentation of the covenant to Israel completely disappears. It was the fulfillment of what Sarah’s death was a type — the passing away for the time of all such overtures of the covenant to Israel. Nowhere do we hear of it renewed after that. No doubt Sarah will rise again, and so the new covenant will appear when God works in the latter day in the Jewish people. But meanwhile the presentation of the covenant to Israel, as that which God was willing there and then to bring in, which was the offer then made by grace, completely passes from view, and a new thing takes its place.
The Call of Rebekah
So it is here. Immediately after the death and burial of Sarah, a new person comes before us, another object distinct from what we have seen, and what is it? The introduction of a wholly unheard-of personage, called to be the bride of Isaac, the figuratively dead and risen son of promise. It is no more a question of covenant dealings. The call of Rebekah was not thought of before — it is altogether a fresh element in the history. Then again we have the type, so familiar to us, of Eliezer, the trusty servant of all that the father had, now the executor of the new purposes of his heart, who goes to bring the bride home from Mesopotamia, for as no maid of Canaan could be wedded to Abraham’s son, so he, Isaac, was not to quit Canaan for Mesopotamia. Eliezer was to bring the bride, if willing, but Isaac must not go there. Nothing is more strongly insisted on than this, and to its typical meaning I must call your attention. The servant proposes a difficulty: Suppose she is not willing to come? Is Isaac to go for her? “Abraham said unto him, Beware that thou bring not my son thither again.” When the church is being called as a bride for Christ, He remains exclusively in heavenly places. He has nothing to do with the world while the church is in process of being gathered from among Jews and Gentiles. He does not leave heaven, nor come to the world to have associations with the earth, while it is a question of forming the bride, the Lamb’s wife. In relation to the call of the church, Christ is exclusively heavenly. It is the very same Isaac who had been under the sentence of death sacrificially. As Isaac is raised again in figure and must on no account go from Canaan to Mesopotamia for Rebekah, so Christ is to have only heavenly associations, and none with the world, while the church-calling is in progress. When Christ has His associations with the world, we may have our place there too; if Christ is entirely outside it, as He is manifestly apart from it now in heaven, so should we be.
W. Kelly (adapted)
Family Character - Rebekah
There is a lesson regarding character and mind-set in Rebekah’s history to which I would call your attention. Rebekah comes forth at the call of Abraham’s servant, but a character had previously been formed, as it is with us all, more or less, before we are converted. We may heed the separating call and power of the Lord, but the character and mind derived from nature, from education or from family habits we take with us after we have been born of the Spirit, and they may carry in us from Mesopotamia to the house of Abraham.
I need only briefly speak of what took place; Rebekah’s history sadly betrays what we may call the family character. Laban, her brother with whom she had grown up, was a subtle, knowing, worldly man, and the only great action in which Rebekah was called to take part gives occasion to her exercising the same principles. In the procuring of the blessing for her son Jacob, we see this Laban-leaven working mightily. Her mind was too little accustomed to repose in the sufficiency of God and too much addicted to calculate and to lean its hopes on its own inventions.
We too must watch against the peculiar tendency of our own mind and rebuke nature sharply, that we may be sound or morally healthful in the faith (Titus 1:13). We must not excuse this tendency of our nature, but rather mortify it for His sake who has given us another nature.
These lessons we get from the story of this distinguished woman. Beyond this, her way is not much tracked by the Spirit. She reaps nothing but disappointment from the seed she had sown. She loses her favorite son Jacob and never sees him again after her own schemes and contrivances ended in his long exile.
Jacob’s Character
But there is more; Jacob got his mind formed by the same earliest influence. He was all his days a slow-hearted, calculating man. His plan in getting the birthright first and then the blessing, his confidence in his own arrangements rather than in the Lord’s promise when he met his brother Esau, and his lingering at Shechem and settling there instead of pursuing a pilgrim’s life in the land like his fathers — all this betrays the nature and the working of the old family character. How important to watch the early seed sown in the heart!
The birth of Esau and of Jacob is given us at the close of Genesis 25. As they grow up, occasion arises to let us look in at the family scene, which is truly humbling. This was one of the families of God then on the earth — the most distinguished, in which lay the hopes of all blessing to the whole earth and where the Lord had recorded His name. But what do we see? Isaac the father had sunk into the stream of human desires; he loved his son Esau because he ate of his venison! Esau, as a child of the family, was entitled to the care and provision of the house, but for Isaac to make him his favorite because he ate of his venison was sad indeed. Do we not see here some further illustration of our subject? Isaac had been reared tenderly. He had never been away from the side of his mother; he was the child of her old age. His education perhaps had relaxed him too much, and he appears before us as a soft, self-indulgent man.
What sad mischief opens to our view in this family scene! Are we saying too much to say that one parent was catering to nature in one of the sons, and the other parent to the other son? Isaac’s love of venison may have encouraged Esau in the chase, as Rebekah’s cleverness, brought from her brother’s house in Padan-aram, seems to have formed the mind and character of her favorite Jacob. What sorrow and cause of humiliation is here! Is this a household of faith? Is this a God-fearing family? Yes, Isaac, Rebekah and Jacob are children of promise and heirs of His kingdom, but they gave precedence to their own desires over acting in faith and obedience to God’s promises.
The Consequences
At another time and in other actions this family delights and edifies us. See Isaac in the greater part of chapter 26; his conduct is altogether worthy of a heavenly stranger on the earth. He suffers and takes it patiently, and his altar and his tent witness his holy, unearthly character. So with Rebekah in chapter 24; in faith she consents to cross the desert alone with a stranger because her heart was set upon the heir of the promises. But here in chapter 27, what shame fills the scene, and we blush and are confounded that heirs of promise and children of God could so behave!
But it remains for us to see grace assuming its high, triumphant place and attitude. Isaac loses his purpose touching Esau, Rebekah has to part with Jacob, and Jacob himself, instead of getting the birthright and the blessing in his own way, has to go forth a penniless exile from the place of his inheritance. The only wages of sin is death, but grace takes its high place and shines through Jehovah’s burning holiness.
Jacob, the son and heir, has to lie down alone, uncared for, unsheltered, the stones of the place his only pillow. But grace is preparing a glorious rest for him; he listens to the voice of wondrous love, and he is shown worlds of light in this place of solitude and darkness. He sees himself, though so erring, so poor and so vile, thus associated with an all-pervading glory full of present mercies and consolations. The holiness of grace still leaves him a wanderer, but the riches of grace will tell him of present consolation and of future sure glories.
There is then such a thing as family character, and the recollection of this, when we are dealing with ourselves, should make us watchful and jealous over all our peculiar habits and tendencies. When we are dealing with others, it should make us considerate and of an interceding spirit, remembering that there is a force of early habit and education working more or less in all of us. But let us not forget that if a certain family character clings to us or habits with which birth has connected us, so are we debtors to exhibit that character with which our birth and education in the heavenly family have since connected us.
J. G. Bellett (adapted)
Isaac and Rebekah
Let us examine some parts of the life of Abraham and his extended family. In Genesis 22 we find God testing his faith, when He instructs him to go and offer this beloved son as a burnt offering. It must have torn Abraham’s heart very much, but he started out in simple obedience to do as he had been told. God, however, stopped him short of actually offering his son and provided a ram as a substitute for Isaac.
In this testing of Abraham, God wanted to express to us something of the great cost to Himself in the giving of His only-begotten Son. God loved guilty sinners, but His absolute holiness prevented Him from showing mercy until He had a way to do it righteously. This was accomplished when God sent His Son into this world and allowed wicked men to crucify Him; then on the cross in those three hours of darkness God poured out on His sinless head the judgment due to sins, so that He might be able to come out and save guilty sinners, and yet be righteous. Thus we see that Genesis 22 is more than history; it is an unfolding of the heart of God in a type. “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:16).
The Procurement of a Wife
Then in Genesis 24 we find Abraham acting to procure a wife, a companion, for that son of his love. This is the longest chapter in Genesis and one of the longest in the Old Testament, and it is all devoted to a man getting a wife. Why should God enter into such details of this family scene? It is to tell us that He is interested in His Son having a bride and to unfold His purposes in the Son of His love.
That beloved One had to go into death, the death of the cross, before He could have a bride. Then the Holy Spirit came down to seek a bride for Him, just as Abraham’s servant went into another land to seek a bride for Isaac. He went to find the bride, and to woo and to win her heart to the one who had been in the place of death and who had been given all the riches of Abraham. This faithful servant produced gifts which were evidences of the riches of Abraham and of Isaac and gave them to Rebekah as the token and pledge of the love of one whom she had not yet seen.
After Rebekah heard of all the glories of Isaac, she was pointedly asked, “Wilt thou go with this man?” Her answer was a clear and precise affirmative, “I will go.” She did not figure out what it would cost her to go, for her heart was won, and love does not calculate. Immediately she began the long journey through the desert to her beloved bridegroom, the servant conducting her all the way.
A Bride for Christ
Today the Spirit of God is in this world seeking out a bride for Christ, the One who had to die to put her sins away so that He could have her. The Holy Spirit is here to tell of the death, resurrection and glory of Christ and to woo and to win the hearts of sinners to Him who loved them.
It is significant that the first time we have love mentioned in the Bible is in Genesis 22, where it is Abraham’s love to Isaac; the second time is in Genesis 24, where it is Isaac’s love to his bride — Rebekah. The former faintly pictures to our souls the love of God to His Son, and the latter feebly tells of the great love of Christ to the church, His bride, for while in the type Isaac was first on the altar in the place of death before he received his bride, it could not be said of him as of our blessed Lord, “Christ ... loved the church and gave Himself for it” (Eph. 5:25).
The Bride Adorned
Now let us turn to the last book of the Bible, to Revelation 21, where we see a beautiful future scene. The church is seen coming down out of heaven “prepared as a bride adorned for her husband” (vs. 2). This brings before us what the church is to be to Christ. She will be beautiful because He Himself has made her so, and all her beauty is to be for Him, and for Him alone. We always like to see a bride, for a bride is beautiful, but here all her adornment is for her husband. It will be her delight to be fully and forever for Him. Fellow-Christian, what a glorious time awaits us — to be adorned as He would have us, and all be for Himself! May our hearts leap with joy at the thought of being thus prepared for Him who loves us and gave Himself for us. There will not be a spot or blemish to mar that perfection which is for Him.
The Lamb’s Wife
Then in the ninth verse of this same chapter we read another prophetic utterance: “Come hither, I will show thee the bride, the Lamb’s wife.” Here the emphasis is on the “Lamb’s wife.” This is a glory that others may and will see, for she is here displayed “having the glory of God.” We shall share in all His glory, and while our beauty will be for Himself, there will also be to His glory the public display that we are His.
Just as Rebekah was for Isaac alone, his bride, and the one necessary to his happiness, so we who are saved shall be for Christ, fully in keeping with all He is, and, what is more, we shall be necessary to Him also. “He shall see of the travail of His soul, and shall be satisfied” (Isa. 53:11). Then, as Rebekah was made one with Isaac and so possessed all of his great riches with him, so we shall be “the Lamb’s wife” and share all His riches and glory. Rebekah had not been to the altar with Isaac; he was there alone (except for Abraham, who had the fire and the knife, the symbols of judgment), but she was brought to him later to satisfy his heart and share all his possessions. So the Lord Jesus was alone on the cross in those three awful hours of darkness, except that God was there in judgment on sin. We are to be brought to Him as the fruit of His toil and sorrow, to satisfy His affections and share His glory.
The High Standard of Love
And our beloved brother and sister who have just been united in marriage, “in the Lord,” shall find full instructions in the Word of God for the pathway ahead. They are to represent Christ and the church. The husband is to love his wife “as Christ also loved the church”; what a high standard that is! How did Christ love the church? Even to the extent of giving Himself for her. And did He just give Himself once and stop there? No, He has occupied Himself with her ever since, nourishing and cherishing her. May we who are husbands keep this before us and never weary of doing that which is a picture of Christ’s love to and interest in the church. And as the church is subjected to Christ, so the wife is to be to her husband, remembering her blessed place in the beautiful type set before us. May we have God’s thoughts concerning marriage; the world does not know them.
When Rebekah neared the end of her wilderness journey, she “lifted up her eyes” to look for Isaac; he was out watching and looking for her. Then she lighted off the camel, for that which carried her across the desert was needed no more.
Our wilderness journey is about over; may “we lift our wishful, longing eyes,” waiting to see His blessed face.
Christian Truth, Vol. 4 (adapted)
Obedience Without Reasoning
“I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtlety, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ” (2 Cor. 11:2-3). What does that mean? It means to obey without reasoning. In the Garden of Eden when Eve was tempted, the serpent got her reasoning instead of obeying. She looked at that tree, and it looked pleasant to the eye. That was perfectly true. It was good for food, and that was perfectly true. It was a tree to be desired to make one wise; that had its truth in it too. The serpent hid from Eve that the act would be disobedience, and the fruit would be death. Eve began to reason instead of obeying. Remember that the Word of God is given to us for the obedience of faith.
H. E. Hayhoe (adapted)
Rebekah, a Type of the Church
After the death of Sarah, we have the introduction of Rebekah. He who is at all instructed in the ways of God recognizes in the latter the bride for the risen Son and Heir of all things, and this after the figure of the covenant of promise in Sarah has passed away.
Till the Jews had refused the fresh summons of God to own their Messiah, now risen and glorified, there could be fittingly no bringing in of the Gentiles, no formation of a heavenly bride, the body of a heavenly Christ.
W. Kelly
The Virtues of Rebekah
When the servant came to the side of the well near the city of Nahor, with his camels, he made them kneel down. Then he prayed and asked the Lord to guide him in his choice. He had certain things in his mind which he would look for in the young woman whom he was to choose, and he asked the Lord to direct him. Any Christian young man who reads his Bible carefully will learn to expect courtesy (1 Peter 3:7-8), kindness and industry (Prov. 31:10-31) from a godly girl. If such things are lacking he may well question how she could be the right one. The servant, therefore, asked the Lord to guide him to the girl having these characteristics. It is also important to see where he looked for her. It was not on the busy street of the city but by the side of the well. This makes us think of a place where the Word of God is read and spoken of. The Lord Jesus said, “The water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life” (John 4:14). You cannot expect to find the right girl in the wrong place. You will find her in the path of obedience, typified here by the water of the well (Eph. 5:26).
Moreover the servant asked that he might not only know the right one by her courtesy, kindness and industry, but by the fact that she refreshed him, and also that by watering his camels she helped him on his journey as a true helpmeet. Some girls are no spiritual help to the young man who takes them out. They drag him down instead of helping him, and hinder him on his spiritual journey. Dear young believer, if you meet the right girl you will find she will refresh your soul in the Lord, and if she does not do this from the very start, then be careful.
While the servant was praying and asking the Lord’s guidance, Rebekah came out to the well. He then courteously approached her and asked for a drink of water from her pitcher. She respectfully gave him a drink and offered to draw water for his ten camels. What a task this was, to draw water for ten camels but she did it quickly and willingly! The servant could only wonder and hold his peace as she did so. His prayer had been more than answered. He had not asked for good looks, for beauty is only skin deep, but he had sought the beauty that abides as the Scripture says “Favor (gracefulness) is deceitful, and beauty is vain: but a woman that feareth the Lord, she shall be praised” (Prov. 31:30). But now the servant had found the beauty that abides, in a damsel who was “very fair to look upon.” How the Lord delights to exceed His promises, and to do for us more than we ask or think!
A Word on Courtships, G. H. Hayhoe
Rebekah
“And they called Rebekah, and said unto her, Wilt thou go with this man? And she said, I will go.” “And Isaac brought her into his mother Sarah’s tent, and took Rebekah, and she became his wife; and he loved her: and Isaac was comforted after his mother’s death” (Gen. 24:58, 67).
Thine the beauty and the glory,
Heir of all things, Son of God;
Shining o’er me, and before me —
Lighting all the desert road.
Buried in the world’s dark city,
I had perished with my race;
But the Steward, sent to save me,
Met me in his Master’s grace.
Asked me for a little water;
Let me quench his camels’ thirst;
Saw in me, Bethuel’s daughter,
Her he prayed for at the first.
Could I hear this eldest Servant
And for Isaac not be won?
Oh, the Father loved and sought me,
Sent and claimed me for His Son.
Let the token on my forehead,
Let the bracelets on my hands —
Prove me chosen — now the daughter
Of the Lord of all the lands.
I will go — how should I tarry?
He — His Father’s own delight —
He was unto death obedient:
Let me walk with Him in white.
I shall see Him in His beauty;
He Himself His bride will meet;
I shall dwell with Him forever,
In companionship complete.
Author unknown