Church Hopping

A good Bible trivia question from Genesis 25 is who was Abraham’s second wife? You will see Abraham’s last recorded act of faithfulness to God when he sends his other sons away from Isaac. This is because he wanted to avoid any conflict over who was to receive the inheritance. God told Abraham that Isaac was to be the recipient and Abraham wanted to ensure that would happen.

After Abraham’s full life has ended he is “gathered to his people.” This is a very interesting study for you. Generally when a faithful man dies in the OT, the Scriptures say that he was “gathered to his people.” There is a theory that faithful men (and women) of the Old Testament, did not go straight to heaven, but were gathered in a waiting place called Sheol. Christ came and declared His victory over sin after His death and they ascended into heaven. Jesus tells a parable in Luke 16:19-31 that gives credence to this idea (though it is only a parable). This is only a theory, though not totally unreasonable.

Isaac and his family are the focus of the second half of this chapter and you are about to witness an extremely dysfunctional family. Verse 28 is obvious foreshadowing of the impending drama. You also see more obviously here a theme in the book of Genesis. That theme is that God is going to choose who He wants to choose. Esau should have been the one to receive the blessing from God, but instead God chooses Jacob. Remember that God explicitly told them that Jacob was to be the one to receive the blessing since this will be important later.

The last story seems absolutely ridiculous. Even though Jacob took advantage of the situation, Esau is the one whom the author blames. He must have been incredibly short-sighted to give up his future for something to eat. Rarely does the Bible blatantly criticize someone’s actions, usually it just shows the consequences. Here the author makes a point to say what Esau did was wrong.

I think Genesis 24 might be one of the most friendly and uplifting passages we have had in a while. We see the kindness of the servant in taking on this task for Abraham. Note that he places his hand under his thigh. I have heard that this meant he was touching his genitals which may have been a sign of trust in that culture. I’m glad business deals don’t go down like that anymore, as I would trust no man. Abraham chooses to pick a wife for Isaac from his clan back in Mesopotamia. This could be a sign of faith, because it keeps Abraham and his descendants separate from the Canaanites but God never commands him not to intermarry.

We also see someone who has great faith besides Abraham. The servant shows faith in believing the sign will happen and Rebekah and her family show faith by allowing her to go (though I’m sure the jewelry helped too). Rebekah was obviously very kind and patient if she was willing to take the time to water 10 camels. And the jewelry she was given seemed to have been a sign of great wealth to her family since Laban is very cordial after seeing it. Once again we see extreme hospitality to outsiders. People do not appear to mind sacrificing so that guests are comfortable.

The writer must have really enjoyed the story of the servant because he tells it once and then tells it again as the servant recaps. Probably because it shows God’s providence in continuing His promise to Abraham. Overall it is difficult for us to fully understand the situation of this story because the culture is so different. We are uncomfortable with arranged marriages, while it appears that God wanted this to happen.

At first when I read Genesis 23, I thought that this was a fairly boring, insignificant chapter. But then I read more closely and realized that this chapter represents the beginning of the nation of Israel. Up until this time, Abraham says he has just been a foreigner wandering in their lands. This means that he didn’t actually own any land. So he makes a plea to the Hittites to sell him a piece of land. The Hittites offer him a space in any of their nicest tombs, which at first seemed very generous. But in reality, they were trying to prevent Abraham from owning any land amongst them. Abraham has to insist in the end and pay a very heavy price for his first piece of land he owns. Although it does not specify the dimensions of the land, it appears that it was not a big piece. Abraham pays somewhere around 100 pounds of silver for the cave and field. In contrast, David spends 1/8 of that for the land for an altar and the oxen in it in 2 Samuel 24:24.

This chapter shows Abraham’s faith once again as he has officially purchased land and decided to settle permanently in the land that God told him to travel to originally. Normally I think people would bury their family in their homeland, but Abraham shows everyone that this is to be his homeland from now on and he will not be heading back to the Mesopotamia region. Abraham’s descendants will also use this place to bury their families.

Also interesting to note is that Sarah is the only women in the Bible whose age at death is given.

I went to church with my parents recently. My mother looked over at me mid-sermon and saw me looking at my cellphone. She slapped my hands (yes I am married and haven’t lived with her for at least seven years) and said stop texting people in church. I smiled and showed her my screen which was displaying the very verse that the pastor was talking about.

That is correct. I have decided to leave my Bible at home in exchange for a digital Bible on my phone. And once I got over the initial embarrassment of being a complete nerd, I really enjoyed it.

There are quite a few ways now for you to get the Bible on the go. The slightly older method is to purchase the software for your smartphone from a company such as Olive Tree. But I would be cheating you if I didn’t share a free way as well that works with most all phones.

The NET Bible offers a wap version (wap is the cellular version of the internet) of their Bible. All you have to do is enter wap.bible.org in your cell phone’s web browser and not only do you have access to the entire Bible, but also the extensive notes that the NET is famous for. The ESV also has a mobile version of their translation at www.esv.org/mobile. The ESV includes a few devotions and a chronological and one-year Bible.

Most cell phone contracts include at least a bare minimum data plan, usually around 1 MB per month. This should be plenty to cover at least the four Sundays. Though if you are a Blackberry or other smartphone user, you know that you can do quite a bit more. Of course the real reason why I switched is because I have just reached the pinnacle of the cell phone world when I purchased an iPhone.

Although you can browse pretty much any site on the iPhone, I prefer to use two iPhone specific sites for my Bible. You can find an iPhone-friendly NET Bible at http://www.enetbible.com and you can find the ESV at http://www.ibiblespace.org/cgi-bin/iphone. So now I can leave my ink and paper Bible at home and read from my iPhone….probably much like the rich young ruler probably would have. Snap!

Links:

• NET Bible: WAP and iPhone
• ESV: Mobile and iPhone
• iPhone Bible App Roundup (for more versions)