Chuck Larsen

Things are going along for Adam and Eve in the Garden in their state of innocence. But Chapter three is going to bring into the picture. God’s enemy. There is no warfare without a foe and it’s in Chapter 1 of Genesis three that we meet the foe. The text says, “Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made.” The Hebrew word for “Naked” that we encountered at the end of chapter two of Genesis, sounds like the Hebrew word for “crafty” which is used to described Satan. It’s like our English words, “hear” and “here.” They are homonyms but have different meanings. According to Niehaus, “The author apparently uses this homonym and its wordplay purposefully: It is precisely the sinless quality of physical and spiritual nakedness without shame that is about to be lost as a result of the serpent’s craftiness. The serpent is also later identified as ‘that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray’ (Rev. 12:9). He leads astray by means of lies, and he is in fact the ‘father of lies’ (John 8:44). He trades in sin, which is deceptive (Heb. 3:13).”^[1]

What or who is this “serpent.” Various explanations for the serpent compete for our understanding. It has been interpreted as a mythological character related to magical powers or taken as a symbol of human curiosity, the fertility cult, or of chaos/evil. Still others have proposed that the voice of the snake is the inner person. The voice is none other than the woman’s thoughts.  The traditional opinion among Jewish and Christian interpreters is that the serpent is Satan’s instrument. Luther explained: ‘The devil was permitted to enter beasts, as he here entered the serpent. For there is no doubt that it was a real serpent in which Satan was and in which he conversed with Eve.’”^[2] Luther’s idea is most appealing to me because we see that the Demons could possess humans in the Gospels. Jesus even casts them out of someone and sends them into a herd of swine. Further, we see Satan himself speaking through Peter in his attempt to dissuade Jesus from heading to the cross. And it is Satan who is at work in Judas prompting the great betrayal.

Paul recognizes the “craftiness” of Satan in his comment in 2 Corinthians 2:14 where he warms his readers that Satan disguises himself as an “angel of light.” Proverbs speaks of Satan as the roaring lion, wandering around looking to feed on the souls of men. Satan is cunning, crafty, devious and treacherous. He did not present himself as our cartoons might today as a hideous creature with horns, a forked tail carrying a pitchfork. Culver says, “He is wicked, threatening and dangerous, for he is likened to a roaring lion (1 Peter 5:8) and said to be a murderer and liar (John 8:44). Believers are told to beware of him, and to be sober and vigilant against him. This is because he is ‘subtle,’ that is, cunning, deceitful, everything a successful tempter needs to be. This, of course, Eve did not know. One wonders why the Lord God had not warned her of him. At any rate it was precisely the serpent’s deceit, making evil appear good, desirable, and beautiful, that gave him victory over Eve. And the Bible does not fail to make that point for our benefit.”^[3] To always be alert to the wiles of the Devil, Jesus exhorted his followers in Matthew 10:16, “Behold, I am sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves, so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.” When something God says is bad is reasonably presented to us as good, watch out!

^[1] Niehaus, Jeffrey J. 2014. Biblical Theology: The Common Grace Covenants. Vol. 1. Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press.

^[2] Mathews, K. A. 1996. Genesis 1-11:26. Vol. 1A. The New American Commentary. Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers.

^[3] Culver, Robert Duncan. 2005. Systematic Theology: Biblical and Historical. Ross-shire, UK: Mentor.

When Eleazar explained his mission to Rebekah’s parents, they called their daughter and left the decision up to her. Genesis 24:58 says, “And they called Rebekah and said to her, ‘Will you go with this man?’ She said, ‘I will go.’” Rebekah had a servant’s heart without doubt. The offer to water Eleazar’s camels proves that. Boice says, “A camel drinks more than twenty gallons of water, especially after a long day’s journey in hot lands. Here were ten camels. Would her pitcher hold a gallon? If so, she must have made two hundred trips from the spring to the watering trough. It would have taken several hours.” Her servant’s heart is obvious, but there’s another trait she has that is extremely attractive. This is a woman of great faith and trust in God. When her parents vacillated about her immediate departure they put the question to her.

I expect Laban and Bethuel (Her parents) were a little fearful facing the departure of their daughter not knowing if they would ever see her again. There is no record that they ever did. I expect they ask Rebekah to stop, think this over, consider the seriousness of this decision, honey! But Rebekah said “I will go.” Abraham gets all the credit for being the man of faith because he left his home in Haran to travel to the Land God would show him – not knowing what to expect. If Father Abraham is the “father of faith” Rebekah must be the “mother of faith.” She left her home and family when she was no more than a girl, bound for what only God knew. She had only the promise of Eleazar.

Many compare Eleazar to God’s spirit. The Holy Spirit is God’s emissary sent to bring us to his son, Jesus Christ, for a great wedding day. He woos us. He makes big promises. He gives us gifts. He also promises wonderful fruit; love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control, if we accept his invitation. He’s always asking us, “Will you go?” Well? Will you?

I’ve always puzzled over the fleece that Eleazar, Abraham’s servant, set before God when he went to find a wife for Isaac. He prayed that God would let the one who offered, not only a drink, but to water his camels as well be the wife for his master’s son Isaac. Now, if my father had sent a servant to find a spouse for me, I might want to have input on the qualifications. Wouldn’t you? I might ask for a particular hair color, (blonde, brunette, etc). I would want her to be attractive. I would want her to have a nice figure, be pretty of course and have a great personality. It’s strange, but none of those things seemed to have mattered. Admit it, ladies; if you had your choice between Tom Selleck and Don Knotts who would you choose?

We have nothing to indicate that Eleazar didn’t care at all about appearance. But we know for certain what he did care about. She had to be from his family, i.e., a believer in their God. That was why Abraham sent him back to his relatives. There was another characteristic he was looking for as well. He wanted her to be a woman of integrity, honor, strong and healthy with a good work ethic. Henry Morris says, “She should be an industrious girl, harboring no delusions of a life of ease and idleness just because Isaac had great possessions.” I can’t help but wonder how many girls Eleazar asked before he found one who not only gave him a drink but offered to water his camels as well, which, by the way, would be a significant task. I can’t demonstrate this from the text, but I like to think there were several.  The bottom line, however, was that she had to have a “servants” heart. Rebekah? She was the one.

Jesus chose us, the Church, for his bride. He is busy making us what He wants us to be before the big wedding day when He will descend in the clouds and take us home for a 7 year wedding celebration. He wants us to be pure of course, but most of all, I believe he wants us to be servants. He said, “If you want to be great in the Kingdom of God, you must be the servant of all.” He said, “I have not come to be served but to serve and give my life as a ransom for many.” He said after washing his disciples feet, “what I have done (take the servant’s place) you must do for each other.” Would I have offered to water the camels as well? Probably not!

I’ve been married for 53 years come this November 2022. Wow! It seems like a long time. It is a long time to be married to one person, especially by Hollywood standards. But 53 years is really nothing in comparison to Abraham and Sarah’s lifelong marriage. By the time of Sarah’s death in Genesis 23, you can figure that they had been married well over 100 years! Also, it had been over 60 years that they had lived as vagabonds in the land that God had promised to give them. They were soul mates. They went through it all together, hand in hand, for over a century. They traveled together from Ur to Haran, from Haran to Canaan, from Canaan to Egypt and back again. They had shared it all, the ups and the downs. She had put up with Abraham’s failures, even when he made her an accomplice in his sin. Of course she was the principal character in her own failures as well.

Good news for all women. Sarah wasn’t perfect and yet she too, like Abraham, is called righteous. She was Abraham’s soul mate. The woman who gave the most precious gift possible, his one and only son, Isaac. Isaac’s name means “Laughter.” Sarah is the mother of “laughter.” She was buried in the heart of the Promised Land. The purchase of Machpelah, her burial site, marks the beginning of Israel’s ownership of the Promised Land. When Abraham dies, he too will be buried with her in the middle of the Promised Land. Although they were both sinners in their own rights they ended up in the center of the place where God wanted them.

Genesis 23:19 says, “Abraham buried Sarah his wife in the cave of the field of Machpelah east of Mamre (that is, Hebron) in the land of Canaan.” Machpelah is the place. Guzik gives us a little history of the place. “This is where Isaac and Ishmael buried Abraham (Genesis 25:9). Isaac and Rebekah were both buried here (Genesis 49:31). Jacob buried Leah here (Genesis 49:31), and Joseph buried Jacob here (Genesis 50:13). The cave of Machpelah (near Hebron) was the great tomb of the Patriarchs.”¹

Wikipedia has an interesting article on the tomb of the Patriarchs. You might be interested. This is it without the footnotes and pictures.

Over the cave stands a large rectangular enclosure dating from the Herodian era. During Byzantine rule of the region, a basilica was built on the site; the structure was converted into the Ibrahimi Mosque following the Muslim conquest of the Levant. By the 12th century, the mosque and its surrounding regions had fallen under crusader-state control, but were retaken in 1188 by the Ayyubid sultan Saladin, who again converted the structure into a mosque. During the Six-Day War of 1967, the entire Jordanian-occupied West Bank was seized and occupied by the State of Israel, after which the structure was divided into a synagogue and a mosque. In 1994, the Cave of the Patriarchs massacre occurred at the Ibrahimi Mosque, in which an armed Israeli settler entered the complex on the Jewish holiday of Purim—which had occurred during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan—and opened fire on Palestinian Muslims who had gathered to pray at the site, killing 29 people, including children, and wounding over 125. The site is considered to be the second-holiest place in Judaism after the Temple Mount in the Old City of Jerusalem.

¹ David Guzik, Genesis, David Guzik’s Commentaries on the Bible (Santa Barbara, CA: David Guzik, 2013), Ge 23:17–20.

Peter called Lot “righteous” even though he lived among the wicked and came to a very bitter end. God called Noah Righteous even though he came to a disgraceful end as well. Abraham is another man that God calls righteous. He’s righteous not because he’s perfect (thank you, Lord!), but because he trusted God. Abraham was far from perfect. The story in Genesis chapter 20 is another “perfect” example of Abraham’s imperfections! He lies to Abimelech about Sarah just like he previously did with Pharoah, and lets him take her for his wife. Now, if our God is the God of a “second chance” then Abraham used his up in this episode. But thankfully, God doesn’t relate to us in ways to manipulate our behavior. He wants a relationship with us, not legal obedience. Duguid says, “God continued to be gracious to Abraham. He didn’t come down with a big stick and beat him up for failing again. He didn’t say, ‘That’s it! I’ve had it with you; I’m going to find someone else to fulfill my promises through. You’ve had your chance and you blew it!’ No, God convicted him of his sin—but gently.” ¹

So in spite of Abraham’s second failure in this same way, God intercedes and protects Abimelech from Abraham’s lie. Then he blesses Abimelech and Abimelech responds by blessing Abraham with great wealth. Genesis 20:14 says, “Then Abimelech took sheep and oxen, and male servants and female servants, and gave them to Abraham, and returned Sarah his wife to him.” Clearly we see the truth of Romans 8:28, “God works all things together for good, to those who love Him.” He even uses our sins for His own purposes. God doesn’t love us for what we can do for Him. His love for us is unconditional. Most of you have heard the children’s hymn, “Jesus loves me. This I know for the bible tells me so. Little ones to him belong, I am weak but he is strong, Yes, Jesus loves me.” There’s another verse that we don’t sing very often. It says, “Jesus loves me when I’m good, when I do the things that I should. Jesus loves me when I’m bad, even though it makes him sad.” Yes, Jesus Loves me. And you!  Quoting from Oswald Chambers, Hughes says, “It is so common to think that God will love us more if we perform some great work, some external achievement. But the Bible (and here the story of Abraham and Abimelech) focuses on making a great heart. Here God was working in Abraham to create an unusual dependence upon him, because “He chose and used somebodies only when they renounced dependence on their natural abilities and resources.”²

When we think about the two episodes of Abraham sending his wife off with Pharoah and then with Abimelech you can’t help to wonder what exactly was on his mind. Sarah had colluded with her husband Abraham previously to bring about an heir for Abraham with her handmaid Hagar. But God had rejected Hagar as the mother of Abraham’s son and Ishmael from being the promised seed. Abraham had no seed and after some time, even after the promise that he’d have one, he tried to claim his servant as his heir. God said “No, Eliezer is not the chosen heir.” Then Abraham seems to claim Lot, his blood nephew as his heir and God said no to Lot. Sarah and Abraham collude to bring about the birth if Ishmael, but God also rejects him. Maybe Abraham was putting Sarah in a position to be impregnated by Pharoah or Abimelech because Abraham was unable to do so. But, God (great little phrase, “but God”) said absolutely not and he prevented any intercourse between other men and Sarah. He was about to work his miracle with Sarah and Abraham. They were about the have the son of promise with made them both laugh so hard they named their legitimate son, Laughter.

¹ Iain M. Duguid, Living in the Gap between Promise and Reality: The Gospel according to Abraham, ed. Tremper Longman III and J. Alan Groves, The Gospel according to the Old Testament (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R Publishing, 1999), 117.

² R. Kent Hughes, Genesis: Beginning and Blessing, Preaching the Word (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2004), 290.

Genesis 19:30 begins another sad story in the Bible. You can almost sense that something bad is coming when you read it: “Now Lot went up out of Zoar and lived in the hills with his two daughters, for he was afraid to live in Zoar. So he lived in a cave with his two daughters.” I’m sure you know the story. His daughters get him drunk and seduce him and Lot’s grandchildren, Moab and Ammon, are also his children. I’d assume that the catastrophe of losing everything that Lot had when he went down to Egypt and everything he gained while there had been destroyed in Sodom and Gomorrah. Yet, he still had plenty of wine!! Lot ended up drunk, living in a cave, being seduced by his own daughters (sounds like something from Deliverance!).

I would argue that Lot was not only seduced by his daughters, but he and his daughters had been seduced by the world and the culture they lived in in Sodom. But there was something wrong with Lot that was passed on to his daughters, I think. I don’t think that the place was the real problem, i.e., Sodom. Don’t forget that Joseph lived in Egypt. Daniel lived in Babylon. Esther lived in Persia. It really wasn’t the place because these three ended up being a great blessing while there. That’s not the case with Lot. I think it was a matter of his heart. Lot got his love for the world, possibly, while living in Egypt. Much like his ancestors under Moses’ leadership, he never quite got his heart out of Egypt. His heart was in the world. Lot had been seduced by the world and everything he owned went up in smoke as God’s angels destroyed his home in Sodom. Leaving Sodom, His wife, who had learned to love the world also, couldn’t help but turn and look back with longing, and she too was lost to him as she became a pillar of salt. Then in the cave, all alone, his honor, dignity, as well as his self respect was lost as well as that of his own daughters. Yep, friendship with the world can be expensive.

The two children, grand children of Lot, Moab and Ammon, did not have healthy histories either. According to Guzik, “Their descendants would become enemies and obstacles for Israel, just like the descendants of Ishmael. Lot’s life ended in ruin (past, present, and future), all because of his love for the world.”¹ Deuteronomy 5:9 is one of many passages that speak to us about God visiting the sins of the father upon their children to the fifth generation. The history of both Moab and Ammon reflect this truth. Boice says, “…when the people were marching from Egypt to Canaan through the desert, the Moabites opposed their march, and Balak, the king of Moab, tried to get the prophet Balaam to curse God’s people (Num. 22–24). In later years, there were many wars between the Jews and these two neighboring kingdoms. In Amos there are prophecies of Ammon’s (Amos 1:13–15) and Moab’s (Amos 2:1–3) destruction.² All this came about because Lot wasn’t satisfied with his “Lot” in life with his uncle Abraham and left home to go out on his own in an unwelcoming world. I think I’ll just stay home!

¹ David Guzik, Genesis, David Guzik’s Commentaries on the Bible (Santa Barbara, CA: David Guzik, 2013), Ge 19:33–38.

² James Montgomery Boice, Genesis: An Expositional Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 1998), 644.