Genesis 24:5-8

2008.Feb.08 00:30

Read Genesis 24:5-8 | Full Chapter

Abraham, as noted last entry, is assigning his eldest household servant to find a wife for his son, Isaac. Abraham, in asking the servant to accomplish this task gives him two restrictions. The first was that the servant must seek a bride for Isaac from among Abraham’s relatives, not from among the Canaanites. Now, we come to second:

The servant said to him, "Suppose the woman is unwilling to follow me to this land? Should I have your son go back to the land you came from?" Abraham answered him, "Make sure that you don't take my son back there. The LORD, the God of heaven, who took me from my father's house and from my native land, who spoke to me and swore to me, 'I will give this land to your offspring '— He will send His angel before you, and you can take a wife for my son from there. If the woman is unwilling to follow you, then you are free from this oath to me, but don't let my son go back there."
(Genesis 24:5-8, Holman)

The servant, while heading back to Abraham’s native country, is to ensure that Isaac stays in Palestine. Abraham and Isaac are, I assume, fairly nomadic. Abraham and Sarah certainly have moved around a lot. And while Abraham has taken hold of Yahweh’s promise that his descendants will inherit the land of the Canaanites, there’s no indication that Isaac wouldn’t migrate on back to the ancestral homeland. Especially if he went back there to get married.

For me, there’s often the temptation to return to what is comfortable. Having grown up as an alien may have been very trying for Isaac. Returning as the heir of Abraham’s success to his relatives and there “settling down” would, I think, have been tempting. And yet it was not in line with Yahweh’s plans. Welcome to earth. This is one of the key differences of pick-and-choose religion for my immediate benefits verses obeying God, that obedience to Yahweh means doing what is uncomfortable, even when I will not inherit the promise of that obedience. Because inheriting the land will not be Isaac, nor his children.