The book of Genesis chapter 26,
and let's begin here reading in verse 6. Isaac dwelt in Gevra. And the man of the place asked
him of his wife, and he said, She is my sister. For he feared
to say, She is my wife. lest, said he, the men of the
place should kill me for Rebekah, because she was fair to look
upon. And it came to pass, when he
had been there a long time, that Abimelech, king of the Philistines,
looked out at a window, and saw, and behold, Isaac was sported
with Rebekah his wife. And Abimelech called Isaac and
said, Behold, of a surety, she is your wife. And how saith thou,
She is my sister? And Isaac said unto him, Because
I said, lest I die for her. And Abimelech said, What is this
that thou hast done unto us? One of the people might likely
have lain with her, with your wife, And you should have brought
guiltiness upon us. And Abimelech charged all his
people, saying, He that touches this man or his wife shall surely
be put to death. Then Isaac sowed in that land
and received in the same year, that hundredfold, and the Lord
blessed him. Isaac dwelt in Gera, and in verse
2 and verse 3 we are told why he did that. Look at what the
Lord said it to. Isaac was ready there in verse
1 to go down into Egypt because of the famine. And the Lord appeared
to him and said, Go not down to Egypt. Dwell in the land which
I shall tell thee of. Sojourn in this land, and I will
be with thee, and bless thee. So Isaac dwelt here in Gera because
the Lord appeared to him and gave him directions to dwell
here in Gera. And what a wonderful and blessed
and comforting thing it is to know God's will concerning oneself,
especially during a trial, especially during trouble. Here a famine
had come, and Isaac was going down to Egypt, and the Lord stopped
him and said, dwell here in Gera. Now, I know by experience, and
some of you do too, that the most happy occasion in my life
has been when the Lord directed my steps, and he made me to know
that I was in his will. Jeremiah said this, ìLord, I
know that the way of man is not in himself. It is not in man
that walketh to direct his steps.î And then he prayed O Lord, correct
me, lead me, guide me, do it with mercy, lest you bring me
to nothing, but guide me." Isaac had determined here in verse
1 to go down to Egypt, and he determined that out of necessity.
He had no choice. But can you imagine how apprehensive
he must have been? He was going to a land that he
had never been into before. He's going to be with people
that didn't speak his language, maybe never heard of the Egyptian
language spoken of before. All the anxiety about it, all
the questions about it. And here the Lord stops him in
verse 2 and says, don't go down to Egypt. You turn aside and
dwell here in this land. You dwell here in Gera and I
will bless you. How happy that this man and his
little group must have been. Living in a dangerous world we
are, aren't we? And isn't it a wonderful thing
when you and I can know that the Lord is directing our steps,
that He is leading us? He leadeth me, O blessed thought,
O words with heavenly comfort wrought, Whatever I do, wherever
I be, still tis His hand that leadeth me." What a blessed thought
that is, especially in the world in which we live. And there is
something else here. Not only did he speak to Isaac
and said, dwell here in this land and I will bless you, but
he gave him this refreshing promise. of the Lord's presence. See what
he said there in verse 3? Sojourn in this land, and I will
be with thee. I will be with thee. What a blessing!
Not only to be directed of the Lord, but to have this refreshing
promise, I'll be with you. Old John Newton said, A prison
would palace its proof if Jesus would dwell with me there. What
does it matter where we are? if we have His promised presence. And don't you imagine this changed
everything? It changed everything. It always
does when we receive this refreshing promise that I'll be with you.
Isaac and his little group was going down there so apprehensive,
laboring, All these questions about what's going to happen
when we get there, where we're going to live, what kind of people
we're going to be among, all these questions, all the anxiety
of it all. And here the Lord comes and says,
Turn aside together, and I will be with you. I'll be with you. I'll direct your steps, and I'll
be with you. Look over here in Genesis chapter
26, and look over in Proverbs chapter 16. Look at Proverbs 16, verse 9. Proverbs 16, verse 9. Look at this. I think Isaac is a very good
example of this verse. Proverbs 16, verse 9. A man's
heart devises his way. He plans His way. He purposes
which way He's going. But look at this, but the Lord
directeth His steps. We have all these plans, don't
we? But it doesn't bother us at all when the Lord interrupts
our plans and says, I know what you've planned, I know what you've
purposed, but I'm going to interfere with them, and I'm going to direct
your steps. But that doesn't bother us, does
it? That's a blessing to us when we know that the Lord is doing
it. Because look in verse 7. Look
in verse 7. It would have been a wonderful
thing if Isaac had remembered this. The Lord told him, Isaac,
I'll be with you. I'll direct your steps. And here's
what happens when the Lord directs a man's steps. When a man's ways
please the Lord, He maketh even his enemies to be at peace with
him." Ain't that wonderful? Isaac forgot that, didn't he? Here he was, he faced the men
of Gera, the Philistines, and he became afraid. And he said
of Rebekah, she's my sister. Why would he say that? He said,
I feared you fellows. I feared what you might do to
me to get my wife. He forgot the Lord was with him. The Lord was directing his steps.
And when the Lord directs a man's steps, what happens? He makes
even his enemies to be at peace with him. His enemies to be at
peace with him. What does this teach us? Look
back over in our text. What does this teach us? When
the Lord spoke this to Isaac and said, I'll be with you and
I'll bless you, and yet, Isaac, for a while at least, forgot
this promise. He forgot the promise the Lord
would be with him and uphold it. And he lied, and he failed. What does this teach us? Well,
it teaches us, first of all, this. God's promises to us are
sure. They're true. All the promises
of God in Christ are yea and amen. But if you and I would
live upon the strength of these promises and the joy and the
assurance of these promises, we must hold them in our memory
and live upon these promises by faith. The promises of God
are sure, but the strength of those promises are not sure.
See what I'm saying? The joy of those promises, the
assurance of our heart, that isn't sure. If we're going to
have the joy and the strength of those promises, then we have
to keep them in our memory. We have to keep them in our hearts.
We have to live upon these promises by faith. Except you believe,
you shall not be established. Why would Isaac fear and lie? The Lord had promised him, I'll
be with you. He obviously forgot. You say, why, Bruce, how could
you say that about this great prophet? Isaac was a great man
of God, and you said he forgot? Well, he's a man just like we
are, brothers and sisters. A man of like passion. Have you
ever forgot a promise? Have you ever sinned? Have you
ever been tempted and failed because you forgot a promise?
Why did he fear he wasn't living by faith upon this promise? And
therefore, he failed. He lied. The Lord Jesus, and you remember
this occasion very well. One of my favorite incidences
in the Scriptures. And it shows us how we have to
live upon the promise by faith. And there's a blessing in that.
There's a joy in that. There's a strength in that. The
Lord Jesus had raised from the dead, and the disciples were
gathered in the upper room, Thomas wasn't there, and the Lord appeared
to him, and they seen him. Then Thomas came in after the
Lord left, and they said, Thomas, we've seen the Lord. Well, he
said, I'm not going to believe it for a minute. When I put my
fingers in the prints of the nails, and when I thrust my hand
into his side, I'll believe it. Well, eight days later, the Lord
Jesus appeared to him again. And he said, Thomas, reach hither
your Fingers, put them in the prints of the nails. Reach your
hand and thrust it into my side, and be not faithless, but believe
it. And Thomas said, My Lord and my God. And he said, Thomas,
because you've seen me, you believe me. And then he gave this precious
promise. Blessed. Blessed is the man,
blessed is the woman. They've not seen me, and yet
they believe me. How is he blessed? Those who
believe those wounds are in His hand and that hold in His sight.
Those who believe those wounds are there. How are they blessed? Well, they're blessed to know
this. That's the very proof that our sins are no more. That's
the very proof that our sins have been purged. This I know
with all my heart. His wounds have paid my ransom. If you believe in those wounds
in the Savior's hands inside, you're a blessed man. That's
a promise. Ain't that a promise? The next
time you begin to despair and grow weak and weary and ready
to give up and sin, remember the promise. Bring it back to
your memory. Hold it there before the eyes
of your soul. I believe in His wounds. There's
His wounds in His hands. I'm a blessed man. And here's
another blessing by that. The Lord said, I promise you
that man will be blessed. He's blessed in this because
he can have this promise, because I live, you shall live also. That's not the wounds of a dead
man. That's the wounds of a living
man. He's living. And when you believe in those
wounds, here's the promise, because I live, you live also. But you're
going to have to keep that promise in your memory. You're going
to have to live upon it by faith. And here's another promise. Where's
the Lord Jesus at now? He's still got those wounds in
His hand, hole in His side, but where is He? He's in heaven.
He's in heaven. And here's the promise He's given
us. Where I am, there you shall be also. If you and I are the objects
of God's promises, It's impossible that those promises should fail.
They cannot fail, brothers and sisters. And it pleases God when
you and I live by faith upon these promises. That's when we
please Him. Isaac knew this. That's why he
turned aside and dwelt in Gila. But he either forgot about it
or his fear of man was so great that it overcame his faith for
a season. There is something else about
this that I saw in this as I was thinking about it along this
same line. It is not easy to live upon these
promises, is it? It is not easy to keep them before
the memory of your soul. Isaac knew the Lord had appeared
unto him. He knew the Lord had directed
him. He knew the Lord had gave him these precious promises.
But it did him little or no good for a while. Did him little or
no good. Why? I tell you, you have read,
I've read the history of some of these great Puritans, Bunyan
and Goodwin and some of those fellows, and they have lived
for weeks and weeks and months. full of joy and assurance, and
then for some reason or another they fell into all kinds of doubts
and fears and anxiety. The same men that just a few
days ago seemed to be on the doorstep of heaven, and now they
are so anxious and almost overwhelmed with doubts and fears. Poor John
Bunyan got to the place where he said, I could wish myself
a frog rather than a man. Can you imagine the child of
God being in such a state of mind to wish himself a frog that
he had fell upon such doubts? But what does that teach us?
What does it teach us when we see this great man of God, the
child of promise, and he is here so fearful that he has forgotten
the promise, and now he is willing to lie and sin? What does that
teach us? But if you are going to live
upon these promises, you are going to have to be a Christian
indeed. That's what it teaches us. And these promises cannot
be helped in our memory and in our hearts to give us assurance
and strength and joy if we're slothful or we're neglectful. They're kept in a gracious heart.
They're kept in a diligent heart. They're kept in a prayerful heart.
That's where these promises are kept. And that's the kind of
heart they're enjoyed by. I think one of our greatest problems
that you and I have today is our inconsistency. That's one
of the things that causes us more trouble than anything else.
We'll go for a week. We'll study the Lord's Word.
We'll read it. We'll pray. We'll seek His face.
And everything is so different in it. It's so well. And these
promises are so real. And His presence is so real.
And then what happens to it? Well, we begin to get slothful.
Our mind gets sidetracked on other things, and then what happens?
Inconsistency is one of our worst problems that you and I have. It is difficult to live upon
these promises. It must be done in a gracious,
sober, diligent, prayerful, and believing heart. There will always
be something to try It tries you and it tries me to see if
we're going to live up to what we believe. Do you know that? Your old Isaac, bless his heart,
he's going down there with his little group. And they're so
burdened, anxious about going down into this foreign country.
The Lord appears to them and says, turn aside and I'll be
with you. Oh, happy day, he said. Oh, praise
God, little family, turn aside. We're going down here. The Lord's
with us. The Lord's with us. Bless His holy name, He's with
us. But what happens? Well, he failed,
didn't he? He was tempted and he failed.
The Lord has made us this promise. This is what the Lord said. I'll be with you always. I'll
never leave you and I'll never forsake you. And I tell you that
for this reason, He said, that you may boldly say, The Lord
is my helper. And I will not fear what man
shall do unto me. Well, we wait. Just give it a
short time. We'll see. We'll see. I ain't
going to fear anybody. We'll give it a day or two. We'll
see. We'll see. It's not just saying, is it?
It's saying. Yes, it's saying. But I tell
you what, it's believing first. How many have said it before
they believed it? And after they said it, they
found out they didn't believe it. Because the Lord gives us
these promises, and then He turns right around and tries our hearts
to see if we believe them. Something else here, and I just
mentioned it a minute ago, there's never a time in this world when
a Christian is safe from falling. Never a time when he's safe from
falling. He may be down in the dark valley,
and he may think, I can't get any lower than I am. But yes,
he finds out he can. He may be up on the mountaintop
and he's rejoicing, and he thinks, my mountain stands strong, I'll
never fall. But suddenly down he goes. Here
this man, he's so happy, he's on the mountaintop. The Lord
is with him. But this is the very time that
suddenly he's tempted and he falls. We're never safe, are
we? We're never safe in this world.
Never safe from temptation of the flesh. Never safe from the
appeal of this world. Never safe from the roaring lion,
the God of this world, that seeks to destroy our souls. We're never
safe, brothers and sisters. I think sometime, and this is
just my opinion, you can take this or leave it. But I think
sometime, when a child of God leaves his bed, he should leave it with this
thought. This may be the worst day I'll face in my life. Today
may be the very day when evil overcomes me and I'll fall and
bring shame on myself, on my family, and my God. And he believes
that and thinks that so strongly that he can't leave his house
until he's seen God's face and said, Lord, keep me this day.
Keep me. If Isaac, when he had this precious
promise, yet failed, how much more poor me? Sufficient unto
the day is the evil thereof. Therefore, the Lord taught us
to pray, Lord, deliver me from temptation, from evil. We're
never safe, are we? We're never safe. Something else I wanted to say
about this passage. and it's something that's practical.
But I wonder what correlation there is between Isaac lying
about Rebekah being his sister, and Abraham, his dear father,
lying about Sarah being his sister. Isn't it strange that just a
few years before this, Isaac's dad in the same country before
King Abimelech, if not this man, maybe his father, told the very
same lie about his wife. And for the very same reason.
He feared the people. And here Isaac comes along, and
he's afraid, and I wondered sometimes if he didn't think in his heart,
I remember how my dad got out of this mess. He just simply
said, my mother was his sister and not his wife. He lied. And things are pretty tough now,
so I think I'll just take his example, and that will be a way
out of this mess. You and I teach our children
correct theology, and we do that by the Word of God. But they
learn more of the correct attitude and correct morals by watching
us live our lives. If you and I have sinned, and
our sin is known to our children, we should also let our children
know that we have indeed sinned, and we've confessed that sin
to God. Don't never let our children,
by seeing a bad example on our part, think that we've gotten
by with any sin. Let them know as they are subject
to us as their parents, you and I as children of God have a Father
in heaven that we are subject to and that we must answer to. We teach our children more, I
think sometimes, by example than we do word. And I really think
this, brothers and sisters, that if our doctrine and our practice
doesn't correspond, then they won't believe what we tell them
and they won't believe our practices. Our doctrine must be holy. Our
examples must be holy. I think you can certainly see
the correlation between Isaac sinning and remember his dad
at sin. I know a young lady that for
years If you knew this young lady, you knew that she had been
wanting to leave her husband. She didn't love him. She wanted
to leave him. But she stayed with him. She stayed with him. Had some children. She stayed
with him. But her dad and her mom divorced. And as soon as her dad and mom
divorced, she went and filed for divorce. See the correlation
in that? Example. Example. It's amazing
how powerful examples are. Good examples and bad examples. And I tell you, a good example
is powerful and a bad example is powerful. Our Lord Jesus gave
one of the best and most powerful examples that there is in all
the Bible of how you and I should serve one another. and submit
ourselves one to another. You'll remember the occasion
of it. When he had his little group of apostles around him
there at the supper, and they were eating, and the Lord got
up from that table, put a towel around him, took a pan of water,
and went down the line and stooped on his knees and washed the feet
of all his apostles. And he made this wonderful statement,
astounding statement. He said, you call me Lord, and
you call me Master. And you say, well, because that's
who I am. I'm your God. And he said, if I then, your
Lord and your Master, have stooped down to wash your feet, you ought
to wash one another's feet. For I have did this, he said,
leaving you an example of how you should serve one another."
Ain't that amazing? If the Lord Jesus never spoke
a word of how humbly you and I should walk before one another,
He left us the best example of it in all the world. Our Lord
serving His people by washing their feet. And Peter says it
like this, Christ suffered for us, leaving us an example that
we should follow His steps. He suffered for us. And Peter
said this is the way He did it. And this is the example that
He left us. When He was reviled, He never reviled again. When
he suffered, he didn't threaten. He committed himself to God who
judges faithfully. He's our example, Peter said.
Follow his steps. God give us grace that our theology
and our walk corresponds. We believe in grace, don't we?
Then let's be gracious people. We believe in sovereign mercy,
then let's be merciful people. We believe our God is holy. Our
Lord hates righteousness and hates iniquity and loves righteousness. Let that be the example in our
life. Let us avoid evil and walk in a righteous path. Why did he lie? Well, his father
did it. Something else here is very practical,
I think, and I like this as I looked at it. I thought of this even
this past weekend, this past week as I was traveling. When
you go to different places and you meet different people and
different groups and different cultures of people, and sometimes
you feel somewhat uncomfortable. But something I saw in this passage
here that comforted me, And I was comforted in the mistake that
Isaac made. Why did he lie and say that his
wife was his sister? Well, he feared these people. This is a different people. And
I fear these people. If it was back in my home country,
in my hometown, I wouldn't be afraid of anybody. But I don't
know these people. This is a different part of the
country. And as I read that, I thought, when you and I travel,
wherever we go on vacation or on our jobs, the people we meet,
we don't have to be afraid of anybody. We don't have to put
up a front. We don't have to pretend to be
something that we're not. We can be honest and we can be
sincere. And you know why? Everybody else
is just like us. They're just people. That's all
they are, just people. And our same Lord that is sovereign
in our communities and in our neighborhoods is sovereign in
every other neighborhood that you'll find yourself in. So why
should we fear? You and I should be at home in
this world, wherever we travel, wherever we go. We don't have
to fear. And we don't have to pretend
and lie. I was sitting with a young lady on the plane, and we were
talking and walking through the airport together. And I caught
her in a lie. I thought, why would you want
to lie like that? And she did it to impress me.
Just did it to impress me? Impress me? I'm just like her. Why do we want to impress people? Why do we want to lie and do
things and imply things? People are going to find it out
anyway. I was with her not over an hour. I found it out. Ben
Licks found it out. He saw Isaac out there patting
Rebecca on the butt. He said, wait a minute. He said,
you don't pat your sister on the butt. I saw you kiss her. You don't kiss your sister like
I saw you. Come in here. You come in here.
You've lied to me. You've lied to me. That's not
your sister. And ain't it amazing how he said
this? That's your wife. He didn't even say that's your
girlfriend. It must have been more moral back then than we
are today. You don't even treat your girlfriend
like that. That's your wife. That's your
wife. People are going to find us out.
Might as well be ourselves, brothers and sisters. Wherever you go
in this world, be yourself. You don't have to be afraid.
The Lord is with you. And He reigns over there just
like He does here. If you've never traveled very
much and been exposed to some people, that may not impress
you. That may not be of help to you.
But if you ever travel some places, I have went some places, and
I've laid in bed between services thinking, what in the world am
I doing in a place like this? I'd give every bit of money I
had in my little checking account in my wallet, and my wallet too,
if I could get out of here and go up the house. What kind of
people is this that I'm among? But they're just like us. They're
just like us. And the Lord is there with him,
just like he is here with us. So we don't have to be afraid,
do we? We don't have to be afraid. Something else I want you to
notice here, and we'll look at this and I'll close. This is
very instructive, I think. And I think probably it's a warning
to our generation that's put very little value in reverence
upon the institution of marriage. I have never seen a day when
so little regard is being put upon that holy institution. But here was a heathen king,
and it was before the Ten Commandments the moral law was given to say
anything about adultery. And here was this heathen king,
and he has a conscious And his conscience is convicted
about just the potential of someone committing adultery in his realm. And this is why he rebukes Isaac.
He says, don't you realize what could have happened? Somebody
who really thought she was your sister might likely have lain
with her and committed adultery. And then what would have happened?
You would have brought guilt. And he said this, Not just upon
the man who did that, but upon us. I wonder, brothers and sisters,
if you and I don't speak out when we have opportunity about
what's going on today, I wonder if we aren't in some way sharing
in the guilt of what's going on. We're the light of the world,
the churches. And one way that light shines
is by speaking out when we get an opportunity. And our country
today is sinking, and one of the reasons is, is because of
immorality. Are we speaking out against it? This man did. This man did. There must be something about
this institution of marriage. Our Lord Jesus said, from the
very beginning, God made them man and woman. He joined them
together and said, these two shall be husband and wife, they'll
be one. And nothing can separate them
but death, or one commit fornication against the other. And He said,
what God has joined together, let not man put asunder. And
here's a man that believed that. And he said it would be horrifying
if someone lay with her and commit adultery. Adultery has always been a sin.
And it always will be a sin. It was a sin before the moral
law was given. It's definitely a sin when the
law was given. And it's a sin now. It's a sin now. And those who do it destroy their
own souls. It's not a light thing, is it? Aren't you thankful to old brothers
and sisters? There's salvation from it. Aren't you glad there's
forgiveness for it? Such were some of you. Such were
some of you. All of us was in our hearts,
but you washed. You're washed. Ain't nothing
else put sin away but washing. The Lord Jesus told that woman
of Samaria, you've had five husbands. And sometimes we read over that
and we don't think much about it. Can you imagine the Lord
Jesus, the Lord of glory, who loved righteousness and hated
iniquity? He was horrified by that sin. And you just bet when he put
that new nature in her, she went and sinned no more. She went
and sinned no more. Well, verse 12, he says this,
Then Isaac sowed in that land, and received in the same year
an hundredfold, and the Lord blessed him. Ain't that wonderful? Ain't that wonderful? The Lord
said, you dwell in this land and I'll bless you. And He blessed
him. But look at the problems he had.
Look how he fell. Yes, aren't you glad? The Lord's blessings does not
depend upon your faithfulness, but His. Not upon your obedience, but
His. Your obedience at best has sin mixed with all that. But
His promises are sure. The Lord said, you dwell here
and I'll bless you. And the Lord blessed him. Blessed
him greatly a hundredfold. Look over here in closing in
Psalms 73. Look at this precious verse. Psalms 73. Asap, they begin to envy The ungodly. He saw how they
prospered in the way. And he began to envy them. He said, boy, I'm chastened every
morning. He began to wish himself to be like the ungodly. That's how he had fallen. Then he said, one day, in verse
17, I went into the sanctuary of God, and then I understood
their end. He read some passages or somebody
had preached from some passages that told the end of the ungodly
and his misery that would come upon him. And he says, Surely
you have set them in slippery places, you cast them down into
destruction. How are they brought into desolation?
As in a moment they are utterly consumed with terror. As a dream
when one awaketh, so, Lord, when you awaketh, Thou shalt despise
their image." And he said, my heart was grieved. I was pricked
in my conscience. How I'd been thinking. I'd been
envying the ungodly. Oh, how fallen, he said. How
fallen I was. So foolish was I. Ignorant. I was like a beast before you
looked. Nevertheless, I am continually with thee. Thou hast holden me
up by Your right hand. You shall guide me with Your
counsel, and afterward receive me to glory. Whom have I in heaven
but You? There is none upon this earth
that I desire but You. My flesh and my heart faileth,
but God is the strength of my heart, and He is my portion forever."
Aren't you glad He is eternally different than we are? Aren't
you glad He's nothing like us? He says, I'm going to bless you.
And He blesses us. I'm going to be with you. And
He's with us. We stumble along. We sometimes
face temptations and we fall and we yield. But that don't
change Him. Nevertheless, He's with us. Bless His holy name. Let's pray.