GENESIS

JACOB

Episodes from the Life of Isaac

Genesis 26:1-34

INTRODUCTION

Earlier we saw that Isaac is basically a transition from Abraham, the father of our faith, to Jacob who gives his later name of Israel to his people. Whereas it is true that Isaac really does not play that major of a role in the story of Genesis, this chapter shows us that God nevertheless has a plan for his life. In this chapter we see God placing Isaac's faith upon the anvil and hammering it, stretching it in order to grow and mature Isaac. Whereas we may all have different functions in God's kingdom, He does have the same agenda for each of us: growing into the image of Jesus. The episodes in this passage show us God maturing Isaac into the image of Christ.

Whatever else the lives of the patriarchs teach us, they teach us that they are human. God will actually say that Abraham obeyed Him perfectly? Now how can God say this in light of the fact that Abraham lied twice about Sarah being his sister? Isaac too, not even to mention Jacob, is going to come across as very human. He will repeat the sin of his father by lying about the identity of his wife. Yet these come across to us as great godly men. Why?

Apparently the way God measures greatness is not the same way we measure greatness. David did sin against Bathsheba and Uriah, and yet Jesus gladly declared that He was David's Son. Abraham in spite of his lapses is said by God to have perfectly obeyed God. When it is all said and done, these men loved God. They blew it, sometimes monumentally; however, they loved God. That is ultimately what God wants from us, our hearts. The person who is always perfect but is not passionately in love with Jesus will never make the same impact for Jesus that the flawed Christian can who loves God passionately. Paul was flawed, whereas James the half-brother of Jesus was perfect. Guess which one though changed the world?

COMMAND TO REMAIN IN CANAAN (26:1-6)

Once again famine hits the land of Canaan. Today the southern part of Israel is always just a few inches of rainfall away from being a complete desert. Famines regularly hit the southern part of Canaan where Isaac and Abraham lived. Apparently Isaac's first inclination was to go down to Egypt because of its regular abundant harvests.

One element is going to be recurring through this passage: like father like son. Abraham goes to Egypt during times of famine, so where does Isaac his son initially head for? Egypt!

Whereas God had not directly intervened from keeping Abraham from going to Egypt (Gen. 12:10), God does step in directly and instruct Isaac NOT to go down to Egypt. God had promised to give the land of Canaan to Abraham and his descendants, which included Isaac. God had designated this land for Isaac and the other descendants of Abraham, and God did not want Isaac to leave this land.

God promises Isaac the same promise He had earlier made to Abraham:

"Sojourn in this land and I will be with you
and BLESS you,
for to you and to your SEED I will give all these lands,
and I will establish THE OATH WHICH I SWORE TO YOUR FATHER ABRAHAM.
And I will multiply your SEED AS THE STARS OF HEAVEN
and will give your SEED all these lands;
and by your SEED ALL THE NATIONS OF THE EARTH SHALL BE BLESSED" (26:3-4).

To his credit Isaac obeys God and remains in the land. As we shall see, even though Isaac obeys God, God will test him.

ISAAC AND ABIMELECH (26:7-11)

Because God told Isaac not to leave the land of Canaan, he settles in Gerar in the land of the Philistines. (The Philistines were originally part of the Mycenean culture of ancient Greece, a great sea-faring nation.) The ruler of Gerar is Abimelech, probably the same Abimelech of Gen. 20. Although 80 years have elapsed since the episode with Abraham, 80 years would have been nothing for this man since people lived longer in those days.

Once more the principle "like father, like son" comes into play while Isaac is in Gerar. In this instance Isaac will be just like his father Abraham. Because Rebekah is so beautiful, Isaac tells everybody that Rebekah is his sister, not his wife. But now look at the progression, or even better regression. Abraham the father told a half-truth/half-lie about Sarah being his sister. Now Isaac tells a whole lie. It doesn't stop there. Isaac's son will be just like his dad. This family trait of deception will climax with Isaac's son, Jacob, who will be the ultimate trickster. Jacob will not only trick his uncle Laban, he will even trick his own father, Isaac. We may have more problem with Jacob tricking his father than Isaac tricking this Philistine king. Sin though doesn't really understand boundaries. The tables will one day be turned against Isaac when Jacob tricks him. (Parents need to be careful what behavior they model in front of their children. It can come back to haunt THEM!)

Abimelech just happens to discover Isaac and Rebekah's ruse. One day he comes upon them and Isaac is making romantic advances upon Rebekah. Abimelech knows that Isaac has deceived him because no way would any healthy brother treat his sister that way. He was probably still reeling from the dream God had given him saying that He was going to kill him if he did not restore Sarah to Abraham. He justifiably reproaches Isaac. Abimelech knew that God's favor was upon Abraham and his descendants to such an extent that He would have punished ABIMELECH AND/OR HIS PEOPLE if somebody had unknowingly slept with the wife of Abraham's son. After reproaching Isaac, Abimelech gets word out to his people to keep their hands off Rebekah and Isaac.

GOD TESTS ISAAC (26:12-33)

God Prospers Isaac (26:12-14a)

All at first goes well. God tells Isaac NOT to go down to Egypt and so Isaac obeys God and refuses to go down to Egypt even in spite of the famine in the land of Canaan. Isaac dwells in Gerar and sows seed. During the first harvest the seed yields a hundred-fold crop! That is impressive because in some of the most fertile land in the Middle East, the fields of Syria, the seed yields crops only 80-fold. So all is as it should be: Isaac obeys God and then God blesses him. You see, the televangelists are right: God DOES bless us whenever we obey Him, and He blesses us FINANCIALLY!

Conflict (26:14b-33)

Isaac Becomes A Threat (26:14b-17)

Now all of a sudden the unexpected happens. As He had promised him, God does prosper Isaac; yet God prospers him to such an extent that the Philistines become jealous of him, even fearful of him. With wealth comes power. As a result, Isaac is not only becoming wealthy, he is also becoming powerful. From Abimelech's perspective Isaac is emerging as a threat to his rule. Before the threat can become real, Abimelech demands that Isaac leave Gerar. So Isaac picks up tent and heads for the valley of Gerar.

Something has gone wrong. Was not Gerar in the land of promise which God had promised to ISAAC, not to Abimelech? So why did ISAAC have to leave? If anyone had to leave, it should have been Abimelech. The land really belonged to Isaac, not to Abimelech. Moreover, Isaac has obeyed God and God has repaid him by allowing others to persecute him. We feel that this is not the way it should be, either with Isaac or with ourselves. Yet we have deluded ourselves into thinking that if we obey God, then all things will always go well with us. Our obeying God and everything going well with us are many times totally unrelated to each other. I disobey and do well; I obey and the bottom falls out. I don't have a problem with disobeying God and everything going well. My problem is that when I do obey God, things still go badly for me. What is going on? (It's a question which Joel Osteen needs to process responsibly.

God uses these hardships to help Him accomplish His goal for our lives: strengthening our faiths, our being made perfectly like Jesus. That is His goal for our lives, and He will use any and every means to accomplish that goal in our lives. Unfortunately, because of our stubbornness God has to use pain or suffering to accomplish that goal in our lives.

"The command Be ye perfect is not idealistic gas. Nor is it a command to do the impossible.
He is going to make us into creatures that can obey that command.
He said (in the Bible) that we were 'gods' and He is going to make good His words.
If we let Him--for we can prevent Him, if we choose--He will make the feeblest and filthiest of us into a god or goddess,
a dazzling, radiant, immortal creature, pulsating all through with such energy and joy and wisdom and love as we cannot now imagine,
a bright stainless mirror which reflects back at God perfectly (though, of course, on a smaller scale) His own boundless power and delight and goodness.
THE PROCESS WILL BE LONG AND IN PARTS VERY PAINFUL, BUT THAT IS WHAT WE ARE IN FOR.
NOTHING LESS. HE MEANT WHAT HE SAID"
(C. S. Lewis, "Counting the Cost," in Mere Christianity).

Why does God put us in trying circumstances? Why can't God test us with lesser circumstances?

"It is always good to have mountains to the right and to the left,
an enemy behind and the sea in front, for then faith has its opportunity.
One great hindrance to faith is lack of need. If God blesses you with need, he will bless you with faith; and faith works best in really desperate need!
Faith, we are told, can remove a mountain. Nothing is said about anthills.
You will find no record in Scripture of the Lord healing a mild headache. No, He deals with the impossible cases.
The trouble is that when God gives us a chance to exercise faith, you and I so often cast it aside" Watchman Nee (A Table in the Wilderness).

For once it was good for Isaac to be like his father Abraham. Whenever Abraham and Lot parted ways, he didn't have to grab onto his inheritance by DEMANDING that he Abraham, the head of the family, should get his first pick of the land. Rather he trusted God so much that he allowed Lot first pick. What is even better is that Isaac acts like his greatest Son, Jesus, who did not grasp at His rights (Phil. 2:5-8). So Isaac, the true son of Abraham and the true physical father of Jesus, acts like his family and trusts God; he just picks up his tents and moves farther away from Gerar to the valley of Gerar.

Isaac and the Wells (26:18-25)

Now that Isaac has acted like Abraham and not clung to his rights (like Jesus), all should go well from here on out. His faith had been tested; he had responded well, and now God should surely bless him.

Not quite. While Isaac is living in the valley of Gerar, the Philistines quarrel over wells he digs up, the first was originally dug by Abraham, the second his men had dug up themselves. When the Philistines contend over the first well, Isaac lets them have the well but calls it Esek which means "contention." When they quarrel with him over the second well, he likewise gives them the well and calls it Sitnah meaning "enmity."

Was't Isaac going too far allowing the Philistines to have these wells which were rightfully his? God's people do not have to fight to attain their rights. We can trust God with our rights. The classic example of this is Watchman Nee, the great preacher of China and one of the most influential Christians of the 20th century (1903-1972). Watchman Nee fell in love with a young Chinese woman. The 2 decided to marry; however, the young girl's aunt was opposed to the marriage. When Watchman Nee and his bride decide to go on with the marriage, the aunt tried to stop the marriage by humiliating Watchman Nee. She put up advertizements on the billboards of Shanghai declaring Watchman Nee to be a homosexual, the kiss of death in the 1920's for mostly anybody but most especially for a Christian preacher.

Now what would your response have been? Most of us would have risen up in arms and denounced the aunt. We would have declared our total innocence to as many people as possible. What did Watchman Nee do? He kept quiet. He believed it was not his responsibility to defend his reputation; rather it was God's. Like Isaac and Abraham before him, he didn't believe he had to fight for his own personal rights. If God had given him those rights, then God was responsible to defend them. Like I said earlier, Watchman Nee went on to become one of the most influential Christians in China and in the world.

I believe that this is one of the greatest issues facing not only our nation but also our churches today. We've been indoctrinated with the concept that we have rights and that we should demand our rights. We DO have rights; however, our insane insistence on these rights being honored at all times is killing our nation and developing anger in the lives of so many Christians. We may not be able to change how the world deals with its rights; however, we have a lot of control on the way we as Christians handle our rights. We can either trust God with them and experience peace, or else we can continue to demand them and experience hatred and anger. (By the way if you are experiencing a lot of anger or hate, the reason you are angry may be that you are holding onto your rights.)

Only after Isaac has moved and relinguished 2 wells does he finally dig a well in peace. The Philistines do not contend for this well. For this reason Isaac names it Rehoboth which means "a wide space"; in other words, with this well God had given him wide space to live in.

PEACE (26:26-34)

Apparently Isaac's response to the situation and God's blessing upon Isaac made a tremendous impact upon Abimelech. He and the Philistines had constantly harassed Isaac, driving him from the city of Gerar and then twice taking away from him wells which he had either reclaimed or dug up. Now they approach Isaac and ask for a peace treaty. At first Isaac is naturally suspicious. They have harassed him from well to well, and now all of a sudden they want to conclude a peace treaty? Isaac registers his complaint with them.

Abimelech though reminds Isaac that he had never ever physically harmed Isaac. What's a little pushing away from the wells and the city of Gerar? He could have done Isaac some physical harm but did not. Surely that counted for something.

But more is involved here. Abimelech lets the cat out of the bag when he says: "You are now THE BLESSED of the Lord!" When it is all said and done, Isaac's patience and perseverance have paid off. It probably would have been a much different situation if Isaac had fought the Philistines for his wells. Any normal, natural person would do that. Isaac though was not acting naturally; he was acting spiritually, something Abimelech probably never saw coming. In Isaac's patience Abimelech saw something different, something new, the character of Christ. This character is not natural; it is supernatural. Yes, God had blessed Isaac with abundant crops, but that had not impressed Abimelech. What had impressed Abimelech was Isaac's attitude, an attitude that could come only from God. Abimelech finally realized that he needed to stop messing with Isaac because Isaac's God might just have had enough of Isaac's mistreatment.

Paul basically says the same thing when he encourages Christians to act in a Christ-like manner towards non-Christians, even towards those who are persecuting them: "Only conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ . . . in no way alarmed by your opponents which is a sign of destruction for them but of salvation for you" (Phil. 1:27-28). Such an attitude may drive our opponents crazy at first; however, it gives them the opportunity to meet Christ in us and actually be transformed and be reconciled to Christ. They can't be transformed unless they meet Christ, and they won't meet Christ unless they meet Him in YOU.