Genesis 24. Now, this chapter is sometime
after Sarah had died. And Abraham is seeking a bride
for his son, Isaac. And he's going to send a faithful
servant to do that. And the matter is so important
to Abraham that we're told in verse 3, He said, I will make
thee swear by the Lord, the God of heaven and the God of the
earth, that thou shalt not take a wife unto my son of the daughters
of the Canaanites among whom I dwell. But thou shalt go unto
my country and to my kindred and take a wife unto my son,
my son Isaac. And many here take this opportunity
to point out that believers are not to marry unbelievers. There's no unity there. You that believe Christ ought
not to look to or consider a spouse who is an unbeliever. Paul tells
us why in 2 Corinthians 6, verse 14. He says, be ye not unequally
yoked together with unbelievers. For what fellowship hath righteousness
with unrighteousness? And what communion hath light
with darkness? And what concord hath Christ
with Belial? Or that's the devil. Or what
part hath he that believeth with an infidel? And this is wisdom. This is wisdom. If you ignore
it, it will bring you grief. It will be a trial and a disappointment
in many ways. It'll be a grief to you if you
ignore the Lord's words here. But the Lord isn't telling us
this simply to provoke the flesh or to tell us to deny something
that we would like to have. There's a reason why the Lord
tells us not to be unequally yoked with unbelievers. Because
we see Christ join Himself to believers, to people. His people are not unbelievers.
His people are believers. His people look to Him and trust
Him and lean upon Him as their husband. And so it's a picture
of the gospel. Our Lord Himself has joined Himself
to believers. That is His people, His chosen
people. And so the Gospel picture which
is being taught to us here in this chapter is the espousing
of Christ's Bride to Himself. This is speaking to the calling
of those whom Christ has redeemed by His death and His resurrection. This is a picture of what He
does for His people in the Gospel. You know, the Church is called
the Bride of Christ. She is Christ's bride. She's
not independent and doing her own thing. She's the bride of
Christ. She's called the bride, the Lamb's
wife. And the reason why that term
is used, the Lamb, the Lamb's wife, is because it speaks to
our Lord's sacrifice. in which he purchased us with
his own blood, when he delivered us from bondage and slavery and
dead things that cannot save, and he made us his own. And not
only did he purchase us, but he marries us. He brings us to
his home, and he comforts us there in his home. And he's pleased
to dwell with his people. And so this is the calling of
ministers of the Gospel. They are sent of God the Father
to go out and to tell the people that all things are ready. All
things are prepared. Everything necessary has been
done and accomplished by Christ. And to bid them come. Come to
the Savior. Come to the Lord. Look to Him.
He's provided everything that you need for your life, your
salvation, forevermore. Forevermore. We see how it was
the delight of God's ministers. We see this with John the Baptist.
It delighted him to decrease and for Christ to increase. He said, he that hath the bride
is the bridegroom. The church isn't mine. The church
is Christ's. I'm just a servant. The church
is Christ's, he's the bridegroom. And the friend of the bridegroom,
which standeth and heareth him, rejoiceth greatly because of
the bridegroom's voice. There's a delight, there's a
joy to see our Lord's people being called out of darkness,
taken from death and bondage, and brought into the light of
Christ, and brought into the family of Christ. And Paul also
labored as a minister of the gospel. He labored with the church
as one espoused to the groom. as a bride espoused to the groom.
He said in 2 Corinthians 11, 2, he said, I'm jealous over
you with godly jealousy, for I have espoused you to one husband
that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ. And at the
end of this chapter, it's a long chapter, Genesis 24. It's I think
67 verses. And at the end of this chapter,
the servant brought Rebekah safely home to her Lord, to Isaac, her
husband, as a chaste virgin. And it's a picture of what our
Lord does in saving his people and bringing them safely to himself. Now, these chapters have set
us up for this site of the calling of the bride. In chapter 22,
it was the sacrifice of Isaac. It was the sacrifice of Isaac
in type, and Abraham received him from the dead as a figure. In a figure, he received Isaac
from the dead. And then in chapter 24, Sarah
died, and she was buried in that burying place purchased for her
by her husband. And that, there too, is a picture
of our death and burial with Christ, who paid the demanded
price for his people, that we might live forever in that eternal
inheritance. gained for us by our Lord, our
husband. And now in chapter 24, what happens? The Lord calls his bride. He
calls her to himself. All things have been done. Everything's
been provided for you. So what I want to do is just
highlight a few of the examples that are in this chapter that
speak to and manifest the calling of the bride of Christ to her
glorious and faithful husband. So the servant of Abraham, this
is likely Eleazar of Damascus, he calls him and has him swear
that he will seek a bride among the children of his family, of
his brother Nahor. And he was not to take a bride
for Isaac of the children of Canaan. And so what is this picture? There's a people that our God
has by election. He has chosen them for this salvation. He's chosen them to be adopted
into his family. They've been redeemed, purchased. Forgiven by the blood of Christ
what Christ has done for them and he now calls us to Christ
to hear the Lord Jesus Christ to hear of his riches what he's
Accomplished for us not what we need to do for Christ not
what we need to do to save ourselves But what Christ has done to save
us completely and entirely Just as we see in the scriptures.
Let me read from you a read for you from 2 Thessalonians chapter
2 verses 13 and 14. Paul says, but we are bound to
give thanks always to God for you, brethren, beloved of the
Lord, because God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation. You that believe Christ, you've
been chosen to this salvation. You believe because God loved
you, and he chose you in the Lord Jesus Christ. He's chosen you to this salvation
through sanctification of the spirit and belief of the truth. He loves you and has determined
that you're going to hear and believe the truth whereunto he
called you by our gospel. This is what chapter 24 is all
about. The calling of the bride out of bondage and darkness by
the gospel to the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. Now, we don't know who the elect
are. We don't know by looking at people
or examining. We don't know who they are. God
must manifest it. God must reveal who his people
are. And we go forth as the servants
of the Lord, declaring, proclaiming this gospel because we know God
is going to manifest. He's going to reveal faith in
his people. They're going to hear and believe
Christ. That's God's work. He does that in his people. Paul
said, as a result of this, he said, Therefore I endure all
things for the elect's sake, that they may also obtain the
salvation which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory. Ours is to preach the gospel.
to be faithful in preaching the gospel, to declare what Christ
has done, to exalt him, to lift him up, because he said, if I
be lifted up, I will draw all men to me. I'll bring them. You just lift me up in the preaching
of the gospel, and I'll do the calling. I'll draw them. I'll
take them out of darkness. Just preach the gospel. And we
just trust the Lord to be faithful, and he'll manifest the gift of
faith in his people. Look at verse 5, and the servant
said unto Abraham, Peradventure the woman will not be willing
to follow me unto this land. Must thy needs bring thy son
again unto the land from whence thou camest? And the sentence
here is, do you want me to take Isaac? After you die, do you
want me to take Isaac there and bring him there? And the sentence
is, for him to settle down and to dwell there and to stay there
forever because she won't come here? And Abraham says, no, don't
do that. Don't do that. He said, if the
woman will not be willing to follow thee, then thou shalt
be clear from this my oath. One truth about this is we don't
have to force people. We don't have to put a sword
up to somebody and make them believe. If they're his, They're
going to believe and they're going to follow Christ. Christ
is going to be made precious to his children. And they'll
rise and they'll follow him. They'll come to him. And so we've
got a good message. This servant had a good message
of the riches of God in Christ for his people. And that's what
the servant did. He went and proclaimed how God
had blessed Abraham and how God how Abraham had given his son
his entire estate. Everything is in his hands and
that's that's that's true in the gospel. The father hath given
everything into the hands of his son. He's the the owner and
the administrator of the whole creation. It's all under his
hand and it's all under his dominion. He is Lord and King. He is Christ. He is our God, our husband, our
Savior, our all. And so we don't have to be ashamed
of this message at all. It's a good message. It's the
good news. It's the gospel. We're declaring
what Christ has done, not what you need to do, but what our
husband has done for us, for his people that believe. And
then the other thing is, and don't bring Isaac down there,
is he's saying, don't bring Christ down and appeal to the flesh
by worldly ways and means. Again, it's a glorious message. It's good news. His people will
hear. His people will hear and they'll come. Just faithfully
preach what Christ has done. And we have the promise of God
to bless it. Look at verse 7. Verse 7 The
Lord God of heaven, which took me from my father's house, and
from the land of my kindred, and which spake unto me, and
that swear unto me, saying, Unto thy seed will I give this land.
He shall send his angel before thee, and thou shalt take a wife
unto my son from there. And so he's saying, you that
declare Christ, the Holy Spirit will prosper the way. He'll prosper
that message in the hearts of his people. He'll destroy, he'll
break their chains of bondage. He'll open the prison door and
call them forth. Sinner, show yourselves. Come
into the light, the light of Christ. Believe him. He'll do
the whole work. This is what Paul said. which
speaks to this truth in 1 Corinthians 2 verses 2 through 5. He said,
I determined not to know anything among you save Jesus Christ and
Him crucified. That was my whole message, preaching
Christ, exalting Christ, lifting Christ up and telling you who
He is and what He has accomplished for His people in His death and
resurrection. And then he also adds, and I
was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling. There was nothing special about
me. When I came to you, I was weak and afraid. I really wasn't
very effective in my speech. He says, and verse four, my speech
and my preaching was not with enticing words of man's wisdom,
but in demonstration of the spirit and of power. and of power. It's of God's power that your
faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power
of God. And that's what Abraham's saying.
God is powerful. He's able. He's almighty God.
El Shaddai, able to do as he pleases. You just go and preach. You just declare what I told
you to say. And by his power and grace, he'll call out his
bride, and she'll come. She'll come. Then we see to this
point here how that God makes a difference and he provides
everything. Look at verse 10 now. And the servant took 10
camels of the camels of his master. We declare Christ out of the
riches, out of the riches of God's Savior, of God's provision,
of his treasure. We don't ever lower it. We're
just declaring out of the riches of our Savior. And he took 10
camels of the camels of his master and departed, for all the goods
of his master were in his hand. Meaning, not only did he have
the control over them, but many believe he had an accounting
of all the riches that God had blessed him with. All the camels,
all the asses, all the sheep, all the goats, all the menservants
and maidservants, all the houses, everything he had, how God had
blessed him, all the gold and the silver, he went and reported
to them This is all His. This is what He's done. And these
camels that He brought with Him, what are camels? They are beasts
of burden. They are known for carrying heavy
loads of weight. You can put much on them and
lean upon them and they are strong and they will not collapse. And
they'll carry it through the desert, through the wilderness. And they don't need water. They
don't drop over and die of thirst. They have everything that's necessary. And that's a picture of the gospel.
we come with this message declaring everything that Christ has done,
how that by His death our sins have been put away, and God has
forgiven us for Christ's sake, and God is satisfied and pleased
with the Son, and He is pleased therefore with all who come to
Him in Jesus Christ. resting in Him, trusting Him,
leaning upon Him, leaning upon Him who bore the weight and the
punishment of our sins and obtained peace for us with God, reconciling
us to Holy God, removing the enmity that's here in us by nature
to believe Christ and to trust Him, to believe the Word of God
concerning Christ. And we can't do it. We can't
carry this load through the desert. We'll drop over and die. We'll
fall apart. We're not able to do it. But
these gifts, which Christ has obtained, bear us up. They're
precious truths. They're strong truths. They are
the strength of our Savior that bear us up and carry us through
the desert wilderness and quench our thirst and keep us going
till God refreshes us again at the next oasis. He provides and
does all this and that's what these camels picture. All these
mighty comforting truths serve as strong camels bearing us up
unto that promised land in Canaan where our Lord, our Husband,
our Savior is. interceding for us. You know,
we won't necessarily see it, but when Isaac had gone out into
the field when they were coming, he didn't necessarily know, I
don't think, but it's a picture of our Savior who intercedes
for us and ensures our safe coming to our Lord, our safe coming
to home. Now, This servant had gone out,
and while he waited, he went to the well. He arrived in the
place where Nahor lived, the brother of Abraham. And he comes
to a well, and he's waiting because he knows this is the time when
the young maidens are going to come out and draw from that well.
And he's waiting. And what does he do? He prays. He's praying to the Lord, verse
14 and 15. And this is picking up in his prayer to the Lord.
He says, and let it come to pass that the damsel, to whom I shall
say, let down thy pitcher, I pray thee that I may drink, and she
shall say, drink, and I will give thy camels drink also. let
the same be she that thou hast appointed for thy servant Isaac
and thereby shall I know that thou hast showed kindness unto
my master and it shall come to pass before he oh sorry and it
came to pass before he had done speaking that behold Rebecca
came out who was born of Bethuel the son of Milcah the wife of
Nahor Abraham's brother with their pitcher upon her shoulder
and so you see there The Lord has done this. You see the provision,
the providence of God in lining up all things. He gave that servant
that prayer. He gave him that heart that prayed
to the God of Abraham, believing him, trusting him. God gave him
that prayer and God answered that prayer. And it's a picture
that you that have seen the grace of God, have tasted the grace
of God, have prayed to Him specifically, and had that very specific prayer
answered, it's of the Lord. God did that. God gave you that
in grace and mercy, and God answered that prayer in grace and mercy
to show you that He is God, that He is the God who hears prayer
and answers the prayer of His people. And so this man, he leaned
on the Lord. He leaned on the Lord. And it's
a picture of our help by the Spirit. Because as Paul wrote
in Romans 8, he said, we don't know what to pray. We don't know
exactly what to pray for, what to ask for, what we need. He
said, likewise, the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities, our
sicknesses, our weakness. the sins in his flesh. He overcomes
all that, for we know not what we should pray for as we ought,
but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings
which cannot be uttered. And he that searcheth the hearts
knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit, because he maketh intercession
for the saints according to the will of God. And we know that
all things work together for good to them that love God, to
them who are the called according to purpose, His purpose, the
purpose of our God. And He's working all things.
He doesn't give us, very often, He does not give us what we ask
for, what we think we need, but He gives us exactly what we do
need. And he helps us and intercedes
for us all along the way because we need his grace. Sinners need
his grace just because they're sinners just like us. We all
need his grace. And we learn to lean upon the
Lord and to see how he directs and controls all things for our
good. And we're praying, Lord, call
your people in. according to your purpose for
their good and the day when you will be gracious to them and
take the words of the riches of Christ and what he's done
and make them effectual to the hearts of your people and knit
our hearts together in Christ. And then there's an exchange
between the servant and Rebecca at the well there. And when I
was reading it, I couldn't help but notice the similarity to
when our Savior went to a well in Samaria. And there was a woman,
a Samaritan woman there, that he spoke to. And it shocked her.
The Samaritan woman, she was shocked. But our Lord began it
the same way that the servant began it, asking for a drink. asking for a drink. And our Lord
said this to the Samaritan woman. Jesus answered and said unto
her, If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith
to thee, Give me to drink, thou wouldest have asked of him, and
he would have given thee living water. And the conversation between
Christ and the Samaritan woman, that led to her discovering by
the grace of God, by His hand, discovering I'm speaking to the
Christ. I'm speaking to the promised
seed who was to come and tell us all things. Everything that
we need to know. All about the Father. How we
have reconciliation and salvation with the Father. It's through
Christ. He is the Savior, the salvation of His people. And
that's what happened here. This servant isn't Christ, but
Isaac, whom he serves, is a type of Christ. And I'm not the Christ. I'm a servant of Christ. And
I'm declaring to you the husband, the one who loves his bride.
the one who saves his people to the uttermost. And the servant
in this conversation kept pressing, just like Christ in speaking
to that Samaritan woman, they kept talking and the servant
keeps pressing, are you the bride? Are you the one whom Abraham
sent me out for to find a bride for his son? Are you the one? Are you the bride of my Lord
Isaac? And this is what we do in the
preaching of Christ. We're pressing, we're persuading,
we're declaring, we're proclaiming the gospel because it's going
to be revealed and manifested if you are the Lord's or not.
He's gonna manifest them that are his through faith in the
Lord Jesus Christ. He's gonna bring that out. And
we preach Christ because at the end of the conversation at the
well, what happened with Rebecca? She was adorned. with the riches
of her lord, of her husband soon to be." Look at verse 22, Genesis
24, 22, And it came to pass, as the camels had done drinking,
that the man took a golden earring of half a shekel weight, and
two bracelets for her hands of ten shekels weight of gold. Now that earring there in the
In the margin, it says it's like a nice, I guess, ornament for
the forehead, like it sits on the forehead like that. But either
way, it's the riches of her Lord that was adorning her. And that's
what our God does in the gospel. He adorns his bride with all
the beauty and the riches of his treasures, of his gifts for
his people that he's obtained for her. And so she's comforted
and encouraged with the tokens of the love of her Lord and Savior
for her. She was touched. She was taken
back. These are riches. These have value, what this man
has given to me, what my Lord has given to me. in drawing me
and wooing me with his love and the promise of his treasures.
And she was raptured with the joy that she had when this man
praised God, when he gave thanks to the God of Abraham who had
prospered his way and revealed, manifested the work of Christ
in her and bringing her to his Lord. And I love this question
in verse 23. He said, whose daughter art thou? Tell me, I pray thee, is there
room in thy father's house for us to lodge him? And so that's
what we're laboring in. We're inquiring, whose father
are you? Whose father is your father?
Is God your father? Do you believe Christ? That's
what's being searched out and worked out in the preaching of
the gospel. He's saying, I pray thee, is
there room in thy Father's house for us to lodge Him? Is God your
Father so that you are taken up with the salvation of His
Son, Jesus Christ, whom He sent? Is there fellowship here? Is
there fellowship? Are we one in the family of our
God and our Savior? Do you believe that Jesus is
the Christ, that he died and rose again and obtained our eternal
forgiveness and salvation? And so the Lord makes that known,
he manifests that. Now finally at the end there,
verse 28, it says, the damsel ran and told them of her mother's
house these things. And this was repeated to the
family and they heard. how that everything was provided
for her. She had an inheritance in Isaac,
in Abraham's, all the riches that he had. And so then they
hear this man, he says, I want to go back. And they asked her,
they said, do you want to? to go back with this man. They
wanted to keep her for about, well, it says 10 days. Some think
maybe that's 10 months or a year. It was longer than this servant
was going to be staying there, that's for sure. And they asked
her. and she confessed, I will go
with him. And that's what the Lord does.
He brings forth the confession from our heart, from our mouth
and faith in our heart that believes our Savior. And so what did she
do? She goes with the servant and
she goes back over the desert on those camels, on those promises,
the strength of the promises and the provision of God our
Savior that carries us through the wilderness on these riches
that keeps us alive with an eternal spring. springing up within us
so that we never hunger and thirst for righteousness again. You
that believe Christ, you're not looking to add to the righteousness
of Christ. You're full and content and settled
that, yes, He is the Savior of God. and you rest in him." And
that's how Rebekah came across that wilderness upon those same
strong promises that carry us home to the promised land of
our Savior. And verse 67, at the end there,
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. And so Rebecca, she was
brought into the family of the saints of God. You that believe
are partakers of that inheritance of the saints of light, which
is given to us by our God and our Savior. And so he brings
us in, to me it's a picture of the church. where the Lord brings
his people, gathers his people, and nourishes and comforts us,
till he raises us again from the dead in Christ. when he comes
again. And now this was but a skimming
of the many pictures of the grace of God calling his people. But
we see how these blessings all come, all rise out of the promise
seed, right? The promise seed, the sacrifice,
our death in our Lord and that bearing place purchased by our
husband and our calling by his grace. to Christ our Savior. So I pray that rejoices your
heart in Him. Amen.