Genesis 26: 6-11

Greg Parker spoke on Genesis 26: 6-11, and continued the theme of God's multi-generational faithfulness narrative through the life of Isaac. Again the theme apparent here is God's faithfulness in working through sinful individuals as we see here Isaac repeating the sin of his father Abraham - namely that of lying about his wife Rebecca (as Abraham did in Gen. 12:10). The text tells us that Abimelech, believing Rebecca to be Isaac's sister was both of them laughing (and in some translations, in "intimate dialog") with one another and knew he had been told a lie.

It's easy to perceive Isaac as a bridge between Abraham and Jacob, as we don't know much about his life. We know of the miraculous situation of his birth, the sacrifice, and his marriage, but otherwise not much else. From the previous week, we also know that he had a fondness for wild game, and exercised a favoritism towards Esau.

Looking ahead to the book of Hebrews, we read about how Isaac was identified as one of the "by faith" individuals and how Isaac invoked the future blessings of Jacob and Esau. His sin of lying is not mentioned by the writer of Hebrews. In spite of his shortcomings, God forgave them and Isaac was remembered as an inportant member of the Messianic line.

I missed some details of the message as I needed to care for a crabby baby during the service (it's integrated worship, so no nurseries here) but I thought that Greg did a good job with the message. As I understand it, he's done speaking before but this was his first sermon at Gfbc, and he's clearly been blessed by God with the ability to teach from the Word.