Right now, if you would open
your Bibles with me to John chapter 3. John, the third chapter. We'll begin our reading in verse
22 of John chapter 3. After these things came Jesus
and his disciples into the land of Judea, and there he tarried
with them and baptized. And John also was baptized in
Enon, near to Siloam, because there was much water there. And
they came and were baptized. For John was not yet cast into
prison. Then there arose a question between some of John's disciples
and the Jews about purifying. And they came unto John, and
said unto him, Rabbi, he that was with thee beyond Jordan,
to whom thou bearest witness, behold, the same baptizeth, and
all men come to him. And John answered and said, a
man can receive nothing except to be given him from heaven.
You yourselves bear me witness that I said I am not the Christ,
but that I am sent before him. He that hath the bride is the
bridegroom, but the friend of the bridegroom, which standeth
and hearth him, rejoiceth greatly because of the bridegroom's voice.
This my joy therefore is fulfilled. He must increase, but I must
decrease. He that cometh from above is
above all. He that is of the earth is earthly,
and speaketh of the earth. He that cometh from heaven is
above all. And what he hath seen and heard,
that he testifieth. And no man receiveth his testimony.
He that hath received his testimony hath said to his seal that God
is true. For he whom God hath sent speaketh
the words of God. For God giveth not the spirit
by measure unto him. The father love of the son has
given all things into his hand. He that believeth on the son
hath everlasting life and he that believeth not the son shall
not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him. Thank God
for his word. Let's bow together in prayer. Our God and our heavenly father,
we bow before you this evening And Father, we're thankful. How
thankful we are that you are God of heaven and earth, that
you always do your will in all places, and none can stay your
hand or say unto thee, what doest thou? How we thank you that in
your sovereign power and will, you determined to save a people,
a sinful, guilty people, you determined to save by the sacrifice
of your darling son. Father, we're so thankful. How
can we ever begin to thank you for the unspeakable gift of your
son? By his life, his death, his burial,
his resurrection, he has eternally saved all of your people. Father,
we're thankful. And I beg of you that tonight
you would give us a spirit of true worship, that you'd let
us hear one more time the Good news, the beautiful story of
salvation in our Lord Jesus Christ. And Father, enable us to believe.
I pray that you enable me to rightly divide the word of truth,
to preach Christ and the power of thy spirit, to preach for
your glory, for the good of your people, the salvation and edification
of your people. And Father, be with your people
as we hear. Enable us to hear and believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ. Father, we beg of you that you'd
show us your glory. Father, we thank you for how
you blessed us, how richly you have blessed this congregation,
materially, how you blessed us, and spiritually, Father, oh,
how you blessed us. You blessed your people with
everything that you required. You blessed this congregation
with the gospel being preached here for years and years and
years. You continue to call out your
sheep. feed your sheep, comfort your sheep, instruct your sheep
by the preaching of your word. Father, we're thankful, and we
beg of you that you not leave us alone. Be with us, we pray. Continue to bless your word as
it's preached here tonight and in the days and weeks and years
and months ahead. Father, bless your word, we pray,
for your glory and for our good. All these things we ask in that
name which is above every name, the name of Christ our Savior,
amen. Right now, if you would, turn
back to Genesis chapter 24. Our text this evening is in Genesis
chapter 24. It's a long chapter, the longest
chapter in the book of Genesis, 67 verses, and rather than read
all that, I thought, well, I'll just read through it as we go
and make a few comments on it. Largely, this chapter preaches
itself, which you'd think would make an easy task for me tonight,
but it's preaching the gospel, so we pray God bless it. I titled
the message this evening, A Bride for a Son. I had the message
all, you know, pretty much prepared yesterday. I go through and fine-tune
it, the message, on Wednesdays. And as I was fine-tuning the
message, Janet came in and showed me a picture. Nothing's official,
I guess, so I have it on Facebook. Today, one of our young couples
announced their engagement, and that's something. that tonight,
Lucy and Jack announced their engagement on Facebook today,
I guess that's official, and that's the day that the Lord
gave me this message, A Bride for the Son. In our text, it's
a beautiful love story, but it's also a beautiful picture of the
marriage between Christ, our bridegroom, and his bride, the
people that God chose for him. Now everybody likes to hear a
story where the boy gets the girl. Boys claim they don't,
men claim, eh, yeah. Everybody likes the story where
the boy gets the girl. And that's our story tonight,
the boy gets the girl. But oh, it's also a picture of
how the Lord Jesus Christ brings his bride to himself by the preaching
of the gospel. And boy, what a love story. What
a love story that is. As we read through this chapter,
Genesis 24, We'll see Abraham's a picture of God, the father,
the angel that we meet, that we hear of is a picture of God,
the Holy spirit, Isaac. He's a picture of God, the son,
the Lord Jesus Christ. And Rebecca is a picture of the
bride. And then there's a servant and that servant is a picture
of God's preacher. And you'll notice this servant
is not named. And you know why? Because his
name is not important as message is important. He's a picture
of God's preacher. The message is it's a matter of life and
death. This, it's a matter of life and death tonight that you
believe this gospel, that you believe on Christ. It's a matter
of life and death, but the servant himself is not really important.
All he does is point us to the one who is important. He points
us to Christ, whom to know is life eternal. So verse one, our
story begins, and Abraham was old and well stricken in age.
The Lord had blessed Abraham in all things. Now God blessed
Abraham just exactly like He promised He would when He called
him to come out of his father's house and go to a land that He
would show him. In all that time, how we've seen through here most
all the life of Abraham, how God blessed Abraham. And Abraham,
here's a picture of God the Father who owns everything. Oh, He's
rich in possessions. He owns everything in His creation. I mean, everything that you can
think of, it's God's to give. He owns it. He disposes of things
in His creation just as it pleases Him. He gives it to whomsoever
He will. And on top of that, on top of those possessions,
on top of the cattle on a thousand hills, our God is rich in mercy. He's rich in grace, and He gives
that mercy and that grace to whomsoever He will. And He's
so rich. Is there anything more expensive,
more valuable to a sinner than mercy? I don't think so. I really don't think so. Because
that mercy has been bought with the blood of God's Son. And God's
so rich in mercy, He can afford to give that mercy to His people
freely. God gives to His people and it
doesn't cost Him anything. He gives it to them freely. And
Abraham, he's blessed of God, he's a rich man. And he's got
just one heir, his son, Isaac. He's the heir who will inherit
everything from his father. Isaac gets it all. Well, that's
a picture of God's son. God has one heir, his son, the
Lord Jesus Christ. He's the sole heir of God. Now
we're going to see a wedding take place in this chapter. Whoever
it is that marries Isaac, we don't know who it is at the beginning
of the chapter. Abraham doesn't, the servant
doesn't, Isaac doesn't, Rebecca doesn't. She doesn't know anything
about any of this going on just yet. But whoever it is that marries
Isaac, she's gonna become the heir of everything Abraham has
to. Because she's gonna be joint heir with Isaac. She's gonna
be a wealthy woman, whoever it is that marries Isaac. Well,
that's a believer. You know, you here tonight who
believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, you're wealthy. Oh, you're wealthy. You have everything that the
father has. You know why? Because you're
a joint heir with Christ. Christ gets it all, and you get
it being joined to him. Abraham's a wealthy man. And
just like any good father, he wants to see his son marry well. He wants to find a bride for
his son, Isaac. Well, that's a picture of God
the father. He determined that his son is gonna have a bride.
And he elected her, chose her out to save. So here's my first
point. The father sends out his preachers
to seek out God's elect. Verse two. And Abraham said unto
his eldest servant of his house that ruled over all that he had,
put I pray thee thy hand under my thigh and I'll make thee swear
by the Lord God of heaven and the God of 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 into my country,
into my kindred, and take a wife unto my son Isaac. Now this is
what Abraham said, put your hand under my thigh. It was a way
of swearing of a promise. Like we, you know, shake on it.
We shake hands, we seal the deal. It's a promise. We're going to
keep our word. Well, Abraham called his servant and his servant
promised. He said, Abraham, I'll do everything
you send me to do. This servant's going to go on a trip. And let
me tell you, it's not going to be a pleasure trip. He's on a
mission seeking a bride for his master's son. He's finding a
bride for Isaac. He's looking for a particular
woman. He's not looking just to see how many women he can
get to come follow him and see who might want to marry Isaac.
He's seeking one woman. He's seeking one bride for Isaac. This is a picture of the promise
that God's preachers make. It's a commitment to preach only
Christ. This thing's not a pleasure trip.
The mission, the ministry is not a pleasure trip. We're not
trying to gain a following for ourselves. We're preaching Christ. We're determined to only preach
Christ. Don't add anything to him so
that people follow and believe Christ. Our mission is to be
on the trail of God's sheep. I'm not trying to see how big
of an audience we can get here. We're on the trail of God's sheep,
preaching the gospel to God's sheep. We're sent out by God
to find his sheep, to preach to his sheep, to call the sheep
to Christ, to feed the sheep, to comfort the sheep, to edify
the sheep. Well, the servant, who's a picture of God's preacher,
he's got a fair question. You know, the elect, you don't
see him with a mark on their forehead. You don't see him with any, you
know, distinguishing mark on the outside. The servant, God's
preacher, he's got a fair question. Verse five. The servant said
unto him, Perventure, the woman will not be willing to follow
me unto this land. Must I not bring thy son again
unto the land from whence thou camest? The servant's got a pretty
good question. And he said, I'm going to go
to this land where you're a, your home place, where all your
folks are from. But how am I going to know? Which one's the bride? There's got to be a lot of women
there. How am I going to know which one's the bride? And say I find
her. Say I find a woman. What if she
won't come with me? What if she won't come? I mean,
you think what you're asking me to do, Abraham. You're asking
me to go to this land, people that I don't know, people that
don't know me, and get a woman there to leave everything she's
ever known. To leave her mother, to leave
her father, to leave her home, and come with me. to marry a
man she's never seen and never heard of before today. That's
what you're asking me to do. Now, what if she won't come?
Well, you know the job of God's preacher is to preach Christ
so that sinners who've never heard of him before will love
him and come to him and believe him. That's the job of a preacher,
to preach Christ to people that don't know him so that they'll
believe him. so that they'll love him. Someone
told me once, being a preacher's got to be the worst job in this
world. And then they said, well, it's at least got to be the hardest.
Well, my answer was yes and no. Yes and no. Yes, it's very difficult. It's a daunting task to think
about handling the word of God and taking that word and preaching
it to God's people. That's a job. It's serious. It comes with this
set of troubles and heartaches. It's difficult. But then again,
it really isn't. It really isn't, as long as you
remember this. The results aren't up to us.
Yes, we're on the trail of God's sheep. Yes, we're preaching Christ
to somebody that has never heard of Him before, that's a natural-born
enemy of His, and wanting them to love Him, to believe Him,
to come to Him. But the results aren't up to
us. The results are up to God. God's the one who's gonna call
his sheep. He'll call them, he'll call them. All we're to do is
to preach Christ. And that's exactly what Abraham
tells his servant, beginning in verse six. And Abraham said
unto him, beware thou that thou bring not my son thither again.
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, that
swear unto me, saying, unto thy seed will I give this land, He'll
send his angel before thee. And thou shalt take a wife unto
my son from thence. And if the woman will not be
willing to follow thee, then thou shalt be clear from this
my oath. Only bring not my son thither again. And the servant
put his hand under the thigh of Abraham, his master, and swear
to him concerning that matter. This is what Abraham tells his
servant. Don't you worry about the results. You just go tell
people about my son. The angel of the Lord is going
to guide you and guide this woman and bring you together. The angel
of the Lord will do that. And you just go tell people about
my son. And if they won't listen to you and they won't agree to
come, that's all right. You just move on and you go tell
somebody else. The angel will direct you. And
you know, this is the very same thing the Lord tells his preachers.
You just preach the gospel. Don't be trying to get results.
You just preach the gospel. You preach Christ. You tell sinners
about my son. You tell sinners about the Savior
of sinners. You preach the gospel. The Holy
Spirit will bring the sheep to hear. The Holy Spirit's the one
who'll enable the sheep to believe. You just preach the gospel so
they know who to believe. You preach Christ so they believe
Him. And if somebody does not willingly believe on Christ,
You either keep preaching to them until they do, or you move
on and preach to somebody else who will believe you. Your job
is just keep preaching wherever the Lord opens the door. The
spirit will bring the sheep to hear the gospel. But whatever
you do, don't compromise the truth. Don't compromise the gospel
trying to get a big crowd. That's what Abraham means when
he says, don't you bring my son down there again. Don't you take
my son and parade my son in front of all these people like you're
begging somebody to marry him. Don't you do that. And that's
the same thing God says to his preachers. Don't compromise the
gospel. Remember here, you're preaching
Christ. Christ the King, Christ the Savior. Don't you bring him
down to the level of sinners like he's on your level and you
can decide whether you're gonna accept him or reject him. Don't
do that. The gospel appealing to the flesh,
you know, like, uh, like you're begging somebody to accept them.
You just preach the gospel. You tell sinners about the savior. Tell him about his glory. Tell
him about his righteousness. Tell him about his, his, tell
them about his sufficiency. He's all they need. You tell
sinners about the savior and don't do anything else. This
is no sales job. You have to preach the gospel.
And I tell you what, You'll know God's sheep after they believe
you'll know him before, but you know God's sheep after they believe
you have, you have pretty good evidence of it. So here's my
second point. The servant goes where the Lord
sends him. Verse 10 and the servant took 10 camels of the camels
of his master and departed for all the goods of his master were
in his hand and he arose and went to Mesopotamia under the
city of Nahor. And he made his camels to kneel
down without the city by a well of water at the time of the evening,
even the time that women go out to draw water. And he said, O
Lord God of my master Abraham, I pray thee, send me good speed
this day and show kindness unto my master Abraham. Behold, I
stand here by the well of water and the daughters of the men
of the city come out to draw water and let it come to pass
when 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'll give thy Campbell's 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 once the
servant got where his master sent him, this is a wise servant. I like this man. I'd like to
meet this man someday. He's a wise man. First thing
he did was pray. First thing. And boy, that's
good. We can't do anything without
prayer. We can't do anything unless God
enables us to do it. That's why we pray. We certainly
can't preach without praying. I mean, you're wasting your time
to study and prepare and try to preach without praying. Without
asking the Lord, Lord, bless Your Word. Lord, give me the
message. I see Christ in a lot of different
places. I see a lot of truths in a lot of different places.
Lord, give me the message for your people in this hour. Show me Christ in this verse.
Let me preach Christ from this verse. Lord, give me the message.
I mean, everybody knows you can't preach without praying. Preachers
all the time asking people, pray for me. And boy, I don't discount
that. I ask you, as I come to your
mind through the week, pray for me. But do you know what's just
as important? We can't hear without praying
either. You know, I ask you, pray for me. I promise you, I
pray for you. That the Lord enable you to hear,
that Lord, we've got to pray, Lord, let me hear, make me hear. Let me believe on Christ as I
hear him preach. I also think it's important to
see this, how the servant prayed, the manner of his prayer. He
prayed, he didn't pray for his good, for his glory, He prayed
for the good and the honor of Abraham. He prayed for the benefit
of Isaac. You know, our prayers would be
a whole lot better prayers if we'd start asking for the glory
of Christ, a whole lot more than asking for stuff for ourselves.
That's a good prayer, praying for the glory of Christ. So Abraham's
servant prayed and he asked for a sign so he'd know who the bride
is. And you know, we do the same
thing when we preach Christ. We want a sign. I sure do. Like some evidence, somebody's
heard, somebody's believed on Christ. The sign we're looking
for is not an outward sign. It's not somebody doing something.
The sign we're looking for is faith in Christ. The sign we're
looking for is heart faith in Christ. And if it's in the heart,
God's put faith in the heart. What'd Brother Henry tell us?
It'll leak out on you eventually. But that's the sign we're looking
for, heart, faith in Christ. So verse 15, he prayed, and it
came to pass before he'd done speaking, while he was still
praying, that behold, Rebecca came out, who was born to Bethuel,
son of Milcah, the wife of Nahor, Abraham's brother, with her picture
upon her shoulder, and the damsel was very fair to look upon, a
virgin, Neither had any man known her. And she went down to the
well and filled her pitcher and came up. And the servant ran
to meet her and said, let me, I pray thee, drink a little water
of thy pitcher. And she said, drink my Lord.
And she hasted and let down her pitcher upon her hand and gave
him drink. And when she had done giving him drink, she said, I
will draw water for thy camels also until they have done drinking.
And she hasted and emptied her pitcher into the trough and ran
again onto the well to draw water, and drew for all his camels.
And the man wondering at her held her peace, to whether the
Lord had made his journey prosperous or not." Now everything that
that servant had asked for as a sign, he prayed, you know.
And everything that he asked for, here comes Rebecca. She
says everything just like he asked the Lord. If she says this
and she does this, then that'll be a sign to me. She's the one. Now remember the sign we're looking
for when we preach the gospel. It's heart faith in Christ. And
God's people all say the same thing. If God had saved us, we
all confess the same thing. We all say, oh, Christ is all. He's all. He's accomplished all
of my salvation all by himself. It's all by his righteousness,
his work, his sacrifice. It's not any mine. He is all
my salvation. I'm undeserving? Oh, I'm undeserving
of the least of God's mercies. But Almighty God saved me by
His grace, by sacrificing His Son in my place as my substitute. Oh, I don't deserve that. But
that's what God did. And Christ is my all. He's all
my wisdom. He's all my righteousness. He's
all my sanctification. He's all my redemption. He's
my prophet. He's my priest. He's my king.
He's all I need. And He's all I want. If I got
Him, I got everything. God's people all confessed the
same thing. Rebekah said everything this servant asked for her to
say, he didn't. Asked the Lord to make her say it. But notice
how wise he is. Rebekah said all the right things.
But this man held his peace. He didn't jump up and try to
get her to make a decision. He didn't run up and grab her
and say, you're the one! You're the one! Come on, you've got
to walk the aisle, you've got to get baptized, you've got to make
a confession. He didn't say that. He said, she said all the right
things. I don't know. Is this from the
heart? I don't know yet. Let's wait on the Lord and see
if this thing is real or not. Rather than grabbing her and
shaking her up and trying to get her to do something before she knows
what's going on, he said, let's just wait on the Lord. Let's
see if this thing's real. I tell you, I wish so-called
soul winners would learn this lesson. They've done so much
damage to so many people. Just leave sinners alone with
the Savior. I'm telling you, if the Lord
saves them, we'll all know it. You're not gonna have to worry
about that. If the Lord saves them, we'll know it. That's what
this man, he's waiting to see, is this thing real? Well, verse
22. It came to pass as the camels
had done drinking that the man took a golden earring half a
shekel weight and two bracelets for her hands of ten shekels
weight of gold and said whose daughter art thou tell me i pray
thee is there room in my father's house for us to lodge in and
she said unto him i'm the daughter of bethuel the son of milka which
she bear unto nahor she said moreover unto him we have both
straw and provender enough and room to lodge in and the man
bowed his head bowed down his head and worshiped the lord and
said, blessed be the Lord God of my master Abraham, who has
not left destitute my master of his mercy and his truth. I
being in the way, the Lord led me to the house of my master's
brethren. And the damsel ran and told them of her mother's
house these things. And Rebecca had a brother, and
his name was Laban. And Laban ran out unto the man
unto the well. And it came to pass, when he
saw the earring and the bracelets upon his sister's hands, and
when he heard the words of Rebecca, his sister, saying, thus spake
the man unto me, that he came unto the man, and behold, he
stood by the camels at the well. And he said, come in, thou blessed
of the Lord. Wherefore standest thou without? For I prepared
the house and room for the camels. Now, the longer this thing went
on, the more it sounded good, didn't it? It kept sounding,
maybe she's the one. Maybe. The servant still doesn't
say a word. That brings me to my third point.
God's servants are faithful stewards, faithful servants. In verse 32,
the man came into the house and he unguarded the camels and gave
straw and provender for the camels and water to wash his feet and
the men's feet that were with him. And there set me before
him to eat. But he said, I will not eat. And so I told mine Aaron and
he said, speak on. I just, like I said earlier,
I love this servant. He got one job Abraham sent him
to do. And he's on it with a laser focus. I've got one job. I'm not even going to eat until
I finished. He had to be hungry, gone all
day riding on a camel through the desert. He had to be hungry.
He said, I'm not going to eat until I finish my job and give
you the message that my master gave me to preach. So verse 34. And he said, I'm
Abraham's servant and Lord had blessed my master greatly. He's
become great at giving him flocks and herds and silver and gold
and men servants and made servants and camels and asses. And Sarah,
my master's wife, their son to my master when she was old and
unto him, hath he given all that he had. And my master made me
swear saying, thou shall not take a wife to my son of the
daughters of the Canaanites and whose land I dwell. But thou
shalt go into my father's house, into my kindred, and take a wife
unto my son. And I said unto my master, perventure
of the woman will not follow me. And he said unto me, the
Lord before whom I walk will send his angel with thee, and
prosper thy way. And thou shalt take a wife from
my son of my kindred, and of my father's house. Then shalt
thou be clear from this my oath, when thou comest to my kindred.
And if they give not thee one, thou shalt be clear from my oath.
And I came this day unto the well, and said, O Lord God of
my master Abraham, if now thou do prosper my way, which I go,
behold, I stand by the well of water, and it shall come to pass
when the virgin cometh forth to draw water, and I say to her,
give me, I pray thee, a little water of thy pitcher to drink.
And she say to me, both drink thou, and I will also draw for
thy camels, let the same be the woman, whom the Lord hath pointed
out for my master's son. And before I had done speaking
in mine heart, behold, Rebecca came forth with her pitcher on
her shoulder. She went down under the well and drew water. And
I said unto her, let me drink, I pray thee. And she made haste
and let down her pitcher from her shoulder and said, drink,
and I will give thy camels drink also. So I drank and she made
the camels drink also. And I asked her and said, whose
daughter art thou? And she said, the daughter of
Bethuel, Nahor's son, who milk will bear unto him. And I put
the ear ring upon her face and the bracelets upon her hands.
And I bowed down my head and worshiped the Lord and blessed
the Lord God of my master Abraham, which had led me in the right
way to take my master's brother's daughter unto his son. Now that's
a, that's kind of a long reading there. Isn't it exactly what
we read earlier? It's just a repeat, isn't it? When Laban tells the servant
to say on, Abraham's servant told the whole truth, didn't
he? He told the whole truth. He gave
the exact message that his master sent him to tell. He recounted
all the events exactly as they happened. He didn't use fancy
language. He didn't use psychological tricks,
trying to get people in the right mood. You'll notice he didn't
have an altar call. He didn't have 54 verses of just
as I am trying to get somebody to do something. He just told
the message that Abraham sent him to tell, didn't he? Exactly
what he did. And that's what God's faithful
servants do. Here's how you can tell it's God's servant preaching.
He says the same thing. He tells the same story over
and over and over again. He takes God's word and he says,
thus saith the Lord. He says what God says. That's
how you can tell man's preaching the gospel. Now verse 49, and
now if you will deal kindly and truly with my master, tell me,
and if not, tell me that I may turn to the right hand or to
the left. And every time I read that verse,
I think of something Brother Henry said at least once. I remember him saying this, preach
for a decision, preach for a decision. And what he meant by that is
this, he's not trying to get somebody to walk aisles. And
this is what he meant. Preach Christ so clearly. You
draw a line in the sand so clearly, people have to decide in their
mind, am I on this side of the line or this side? Do I believe
it or do I not believe it? Preach for a decision. Preach
so somebody understands what you're saying. They've got to
decide in their mind, do I believe Christ or not? Do I trust Him
or do I not? And that's what we try to do
here. We preach Christ to you, to everybody who comes, and leave
you alone with God. Nobody's trying to talk you into
doing something, are they? Nobody's trying to talk you into making
a decision. Nobody's trying to talk you into making a public
confession. We leave you alone with God.
Now please understand, I do care greatly whether you believe Christ
or not. I care greatly. Don't mistake
the fact that I'm not twisting your arm trying to get you to
do something. No, I care greatly whether you believe on Christ
or not. But we're not trying to get you to do nothing. Oh, but we care for your soul.
We care for your soul. And even if people don't believe
on Christ, I'll tell you what we're going to do. We're going
to keep preaching. If somebody doesn't believe on
Christ, it's going to break my heart. But we're going to keep
preaching Christ. We're not going to change our
methods. We're not going to change our message. We're going to keep preaching
Christ. Because Wayne, I know this. Somebody somewhere is going
to believe him. I know that. I know that somebody
is coming to Christ. I'm going to keep telling you
come to Christ because somebody's coming. And I sure do pray somebody
here. I sure do pray that. Here's what
I know from the word of God. The father has chosen a bride
for his son. He's chosen her specifically
on purpose. There's gonna be a wedding somewhere. The father didn't fail. He didn't
waste his time. He's chosen a bride for his son. There's gonna be
a wedding. See what we're gonna do? Just
exactly what God told us to do. Keep preaching Christ. The sheep
will hear. They'll hear. Now I tell you,
the gospel's been preached. Christ has been preached to you
as the savior of sinners. You've been told Christ is your
only hope. The only righteousness you can
ever have is his righteousness. The only way your sin can be
forgiven is his blood shed for you. Christ has been preached
to you as the savior of sinners. Here's my fourth point. You must
believe on Christ yourself. You must. Nobody else can do
it for you. Look at verse 50. And Laban and Bethuel answered
and said, the thing proceeded from the Lord. We cannot speak
unto thee bad or good. Behold, Rebekah is before thee.
Take her and go and let her be thy master's son's wife, as the
Lord has spoken. And it came to pass that when
Abraham's servant heard these words, their words, he worshiped
the Lord, bowing himself to the earth. And the servant brought
forth jewels of silver and jewels of gold and raiment and gave
them to Rebekah. He gave also to her brother and
to her mother, precious things. And they did eat and drink. He
and the men that were with him and tarried all night. And they
rose up in the morning. And he said, send me away into
my master. I mean, this guy, he's determined,
isn't he? I'm doing what my master said. I'm not wasting time. I'm
getting up early in the morning. We celebrated last night, but
I'm getting up early in the morning. Send me away to my master. And
her brother and her mother said, oh, people always get in the
way. Let the damsel abide with us
a few days, at least 10. And after that, she shall go.
And he said unto them, hinder me not, seeing the Lord hath
prospered my way, send me away that I may go to my master. And
they said, we'll call the damsel and inquired her mouth. And they
called Rebekah and said unto her, will thou go with this man?
And she said, I'll go. And they sent away Rebekah, their
sister and her nurse and Abraham's servant and his men. And they
blessed Rebekah and said unto her, thou art our sister, be
thou the mother Thousands of millions and let thy seed possess
the gate of those which hate them And here they called Rebecca
and she said, you know Maybe maybe Laban and her mother maybe
they're starting to get cold feet a little bit here, you know
Let's not get in a hurry. Let's not let her go too quick
and Rebecca said no No, there's no waiting. I'll go I'm willing
I'm gonna go with this man and marry his master's son And I
tell you this, we're going to keep preaching Christ to you.
Sooner or later, if you're one of God's elect, you're going
to believe on Christ. You're going to believe, not
because somebody else did. You're going to believe on him, and
you're going to commit your all to him. Sooner or later, that's
what you're going to do if you're God's. You will willingly follow
Christ. You'll willingly come to him.
You'll willingly quit trusting everything that you used to trust
in, and you're going to come to Christ. and you're going to
believe Him, just like Rebecca did here. You have to believe
the gospel. You have to believe on Christ.
And only God can make you do it. Only God can give you faith
to believe Him. And if you're God's, He'll give
it. You'll come to Him, and you'll come to Him willingly. Here's
my last point. Number five. When you do come
to Christ, you know what you're going to find out? He's even
better than the preacher told you He was. Look at verse 61. And Rebecca, arose and her damsels,
and they rode upon the camels and followed the man. And the
servant took Rebekah and went his way. And Isaac came from
the way of the well of Lehiroi, for he dwelt in the south country.
And Isaac went out to meditate in the field at the eventide.
And he lifted up his eyes and saw, and behold, the camels were
coming. And Rebekah lifted up her eyes.
When she saw Isaac, she lighted off the camel, and she said unto
the servant, What man is this that walketh in the field to
meet us? And the servant had said, it's my master. Therefore,
she took a veil and covered herself. And the servant told Isaac all
things that he had done. And Isaac brought her into his
mother Sarah's tent and took Rebecca, and she became his wife.
And he loved her. And Isaac was comforted after
his mother's death. Now I'm sure as they made this
journey, don't you imagine Rebecca He asked the servant, tell me
more about this man. Tell me more about this man Isaac.
I'm going to go marry. And he told her. He had lots
of stories. He'd known Isaac since he was born. He had lots
of stories to tell. He told her about how Abraham had left his
father's house, and he'd gone to a land that God showed him,
and how God had blessed him, made him so rich. And Isaac was
his sole heir. And he said, he's a rich young
man. He said, I'm telling you. He's
one of the finest young men I know. I've known him since he was born.
I'm qualified to tell you he's the finest young man I know.
He's honorable. He's kind. He's honest. He's
a good worker. He's not going to be lazy. He's
going to provide for you. He's going to love you and take
care of you. And he said, I'm a man, so maybe
I'm not the best judge of how good looking other men are. But
I think I can safely say Isaac's a handsome man. I mean, he's
going to be easy on the eyes. He's going to be somebody that
you can love and admire and respect. And Rebecca just liked hearing
about him, didn't she? She asked more questions. She
wanted to hear more about him. And she's riding along, listen, riding
along on this camel. And then she offseas in the distance.
He saw them coming. He's coming across the field
to meet her. And oh, as soon as she saw him, she had stars
in her eyes. You've seen those cartoons, you
know, somebody's heart pumping very close. That was Rebecca.
Boy, oh, she just head over heels in love with him. She jumped
off that camel, and she went to meet Isaac, and she sometime
had to ask that servant, how come you didn't tell me? Oh,
he's so handsome. He's just, he's, how come you
didn't tell me? Oh, he's so loving and so kind
and so tender. How come you didn't tell me?
And a servant said, well, I tried. I tried. It's the best language
I have. I tried. This is exactly what happens
when somebody quits hearing preaching, when they quit hearing doctrinal
truths about religious theory, and they meet a person. Oh, when they meet the person
of Christ, they fall in love. I mean, head over heels. And
they'll say to the preacher, how come you didn't tell me?
How come you didn't tell me? He's so much better than what
you said. Well, it's true. That's true. He is better than
what I've said. Human language can't tell the
half of it, can it? But you come to him. You'll find out. You'll
find out for yourself, won't you? All right. Let's bow together. Our Father, we thank you for
your word. We thank you for this beautiful story, beautiful picture. Christ our bridegroom. And Father,
I pray you'd bless it. Bless your word to your glory,
to your honor. Give much glory to yourself by
taking your word and applying it to the hearts of those here
that we might see and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. And
as Rebecca ran to him, to Isaac, cause us to run to Christ and
find in him everything that we need. For it's in his precious
name, for his glory and his sake we pray. Alright, Sean.