Did You Find God? Did You Look? - Genesis 24

Bible Study Lesson for December 2

This story is unique in the story of Genesis because it is very long and has a lot of details. But it is a simple story about a simple problem. Abraham needs to find a wife for Isaac in order for Isaac to produce the next heir to the Promise. Abraham sends a servant to accomplish this task, commanding him to find a wife  from his family back in Haran. The servant goes and finds Rebekah, and returns with her and she and Isaac are married. The story is important for a couple of reasons. First, as the overall narrative moves from Abraham to Isaac, we have an example of Abraham helping to get the next generation started. Second, and more important for this study, this story presents us with an example of how we can talk about God’s activity in our lives.

Trying to find a wife is a normal human thing and for most of human history it has been the parents who took the responsibility for searching for spouses for their children. Until fairly recently in world history, everyone’s marriage was arranged. In this story, Abraham does not want his son to marry one of the people of Canaan, but instead wants him to have a wife from the family Abraham had left behind. Abraham is probably too old to make the journey himself, and so he charges his most trusted servant to go and find a wife for Isaac.

When Abraham’s servant arrives in the far country and gets to a well outside the city where Abraham’s brother Nahor’s family lives, he prays for success in his mission (v. 9-14). He prays for a sign: that the woman he meets will give him water on his request, and then offer of her own accord to water his camels as well. By her hospitality and generosity, the servant will know that this is the “one whom [God has] appointed for [God’s] servant Isaac” (v. 14). When he asks Rebekah for water, she obliges him and then also begins to water his camels. He observes her for a while, and then offers her jewelry and finds out that she is indeed a granddaughter of Nahor. Rebekah takes the servant to her home so that he may spend the night.

When he gets to her home, the servant meets Rebekah’s brother Laban, who welcomes him and along with the rest of the family listens to his story. The servant recounts the whole story of his journey from Abraham’s side to Nahor’s family in exhaustive detail. It is in the long scene between Abraham’s servant and Laban that we have the most talk about God in this whole story. As people of faith, I think we can learn a lot from how the servant talks about God.

Before going to Laban’s house, it is striking that the servant immediately gives credit for his success to God. Learning that Rebekah is indeed the granddaughter of Nahor, the servant breaks into praise:“Blessed be the LORD, the God of my master Abraham, who has not forsaken his steadfast love and his faithfulness toward my master. As for me, the LORD has led me on the way to the house of my master’s kin” (v. 27). When he begins to tell his story, he rightly attributes Abraham’s prosperity to God: “The LORD has greatly blessed my master, and he has become wealthy; he has given him flocks and herds, silver and gold, male and female slaves, camels and donkeys” (v. 35). He recalls the words of Abraham, that God will “send an angel” to guide the servant on his quest (v. 40, see v. 7). Finally, in v. 48, the servant again credits God with leading him on his way.

The servant gives God all the credit for the success of his mission to find a wife for Isaac. So often we fail to give credit to God in our lives, to look for God in our daily assignments and quests. I remember one day a few years ago when I was helping my dad get up one of his cows. I had other things I needed to do, and the cow was being frustrating, running away and evading us as we tried to get her where we needed her to go. I needed to get to the church to do some work, and in desperation I cried out to God, “please help this cow get where she needs to go!” A few minutes later, the cow chose to turn right where she had turned left every time before and we were able to get her to the right place. As I closed the gate, I said, “Wow! That was lucky.” And then I thought about it. I had just prayed for God’s help. So then I said, “Thank you God” and went about my day.

How often do we do that? How often do we pray for help in desperation and then chock up our success or deliverance to luck, effort, or randomness? Do we pray for healing and then when the scans come back negative assume the doctor was wrong the first time? Do we ask God for patience or personal growth and then take full credit for becoming better people? Instead, we need to take a cue from the servant in this passage. When we ask God to show up, we should look for God along the way. The servant doesn’t marvel at the coincidence of Rebekah showing up just when she did because he had prayed for her to do exactly that.

Walter Brueggemann says that this story “provides an important opportunity to help persons think about faith, what it is and how it comes.” God shows up in the everyday. “The workings of God are not spectacular, not magical, not oddities. Disclosure of God comes by steady discernment and by readiness to trust the resilience that is present in the course of daily affairs.” So often we miss out on everyday miracles because we are looking for signs that point to them. The miraculous and mundane activity of our God can be as simple as a cow choosing to cooperate, or a neighbor showing up at just the right time with just the right tool. If we aren’t paying attention, we will miss God’s intervention and take it for granted. Where did you ask God to show up in your life this week? Are you looking for God along the way?