Genesis 24:5 KJV And the servant said unto him, Peradventure the woman will not be willing to follow me unto this land: must I needs bring thy son again unto the land from whence thou camest?
KJV Cafe
Part 1 - Bible Study - Genesis 24:5
Amen, glory to God. Welcome to program. Welcome to cafe pastor Clark Covington here with another episode of kjv cafe Thank you so much for joining us. It's a beautiful day at the cafe today. We are studying God's word We're in Genesis 24, and we are just gonna kind of get right to it here Genesis 24 Abraham was old and well-stricken in age, okay, and the Lord had blessed Abraham in all things That's verse one of Genesis 24 our text verse here deals with the senior servant we believe Eliezer Questioning what he is to do and the servant said unto him pre-adventure the woman will not be willing to follow me Onto this land must I need to bring my son again onto the land for when style came us and so we have bookended here Abraham being blessed and The servant being a little unsure of Abraham Making him promise to do something that he doesn't know that he could do which I think is a very natural reaction right and so what we're doing here today is we're kind of looking at the the contrast between the supernatural and the natural right like God's blessing and then our Propensity to doubt right and whether that came from the sin curse or whether that's just human nature We're a little bit of both We often doubt I remember one of the first times I read Genesis 24. I kind of in my mind wondered Hey, well if I was that servant making that promise, I would be worried like how do I know that this person? I'm going to get is going to be willing to come back with me, right? That I just take a wife for the you know, that's a big thing So let's look at this idea of the supernatural being blessed by God, okay The hory head is a crown of glory if it be found in the way of righteousness That's Proverbs 16 31. So if you're living righteously and that gray hair that you have on your head or your beard Is is a crown of glory Job 12 12 with the ancient is wisdom and in length of days understanding Let's see here Psalm 92 14. They shall still bring forth fruit in old age. They shall be fat and flourishing Isaiah 46 for and even to your old age. I am he and even to the whore hairs. Well, that's gray hairs. Will I carry you? I've made you I will bear even I will carry and will deliver you Um Second Corinthians 4 16 one of my favorite verses on old age for which cause we faint not but though our outward man perish Yet the inward man is renewed day by day So what we see in the world is a forsaking of Um The elderly often, you know, uh, hey, let's get them in a home. Let's put them over on the side Let's not think about them too much And a lifting up of the young people, right? And you see this in hollywood if the actor gets old they a lot of times they can't use the actor anymore If the actor doesn't even get old, but just starts to look old, right? Or actress, you know, everyone to say it, uh, you know, we see it in the workforce oftentimes Young people have trouble finding a job, but older folks do as well. You know, they throw around words like, um, uh, you know Overqualified or you know over educated or too much experience And that could be true or they could be looking for um Someone younger Uh, in coaching, you know, it's a, you know, I love sports and you'll see oftentimes universities A college sports, especially they're looking to hire that younger up-and-comer Uh, you know, yes, oftentimes some schools will hire someone really notable and older But as you get older, it could be harder because people are adding up how many years can they offer for women Uh, if they're not just really young and they're older, they might be having kids and so forth Uh, you know, that also there's been many lawsuits over that as well, you know Um of companies so forth saying well, what can we do with them or they're out of the workforce for a season We see in this world not even touching on health But it's often look age is often looked at as a bad thing in america the culture in america Is very different the culture in asia at least as far as I can understand The older folks are given high regard. They're kind of giving the chief seat at the table um, my wife's family From lou's tie land and like, you know, if there was a gathering and my father-in-law walked in people would get up and give him the chair Like it was a sign of respect not that we don't respect all people in america But oftentimes you'll see they're they're very lonely, you know, we we used to have a ministry years ago we would uh Preach and teach in the nursing home Uh, and you talk the residents and a lot of them were just very lonely I mean they just really weren't a lot of people visiting them talking to them Um You see that a lot, you know, you see it a lot. I guess there was a lot of attention given to the nursing homes and so forth during the pandemic But otherwise it's it's it's a sad truth that aging in society today isn't looked at as such a blessing but in the bible We see that it is for so many reasons number one Our outward man is perishing right as we get older we get, you know more sore and more illnesses and so on and so forth We can't tolerate things that we used to Um, I know personally when I was young I could stay up real late get up real early and it wasn't a problem and now I would like literally feel sick um But even though the outward man perish the inward man is renewed day by day that second krythians 4 16 And so we see that god is renewing us day by day spiritually And he's giving us strength day by day spiritually and again think back to abraham He was 75 You know when this whole journey started Amen 100 When he had isic so that my rough math that's 25 years there You know and he lived 175 and so the good stuff didn't even start until he was nearly 80 You know Moses as well again 40 years in egypt 40 years in the wilderness of the backside of the desert there And then 40 years leading the israelites again good stuff didn't even start until he was 80 So while ages is is looked upon uh in our country As just like again, I mean there's just so this is like I don't want to go too deep into this because number one i'm not an expert and i'm sure someone listening to this is like yeah, duh, but you know You just think of getting older, you know, and you have people that are on a fixed income and it's just like oh He says a lot of suffering a lot of hardship Trying to make things work and I remember years ago my grandma actually had a pension and we lived with our grandma for a season growing up She had a pension And that was like from you know 1940 or 50 or 60 whatever it was It wasn't relevant to the 80s and 90s, you know, it wasn't as it wasn't uh, you know adjusted if you will and Man people have so many problems with that and you know You have a lot of doctors prescribing a lot of medicine and you have costs associated with the medicine and It is just a rough rough time To to grow old even though the modern innovations and science and so forth and technology It's still very challenging in this world and yet god wants us to know That he is with us spiritually and that we are blessed by him that he is eternal. So age is nothing to him Right. He's no respecter of persons and he's no respecter of age. Amen He is with us from Before we're born. He knows us while we were still in the womb. Amen. The bible tells us that and he knows us all the way To when he takes us home, right? He knows us Uh, he knows he knows that his strength is sufficient for us. Amen Uh, and he knows that as we get older Our faith can grow in him. He can do great things with us Um It's been my experience in the ministry that that yes, you'll ever once in a while you'll see a young person You know big flash of um god's hand upon them, but oftentimes He's using older saints of god and the last example and then we'll get to the break here Uh, there is a ministry out in ohio and uh It's a school for international students that want to learn the bibles a bible institute bible school seminary Whatever you want to call it and the brother that runs it brother miren I think he's up in his 80s or you know mid 80s 90s and he's still there preaching and teaching Uh, though he's he's been stricken in old age and sick and so forth and many many people including a Filipino missionary that we're close to has gone through that school come from overseas And spent years there studying the word and gone out and preached a gospel and so forth and and god is using that individual In his old age and you just kind of wonder how many people you know, um Could say that you know that that that they're still engaged, you know in 80s and 90s Doing oh good work and having a reason to get up every day and being fired up It's just amazing and that's the beauty of god the wisdom of god That's why in my mind. I'm not going to retire until the lord calls me home or until I just can't do anything But I always imagine doing something for god It's just the beauty of being called by god is that he supersedes age and when we serve him we live for him There's nothing he can't do through us. Amen. All right. We'll take a break. We'll get to more of this when we get back so stay tuned Hey, it's break time around here. Thank you for listening to kjv cafe if you haven't already visit kjv cafe.com for more information So what does verse five say here verse five says and the servant said unto him? Pre-adventure the woman will not be willing to follow me follow me unto this land Must I need to bring my son again unto the land from whence thou cameist So we have verse one Abraham's old and blessed right verse two Uh, Abraham is calling his servant put the hand under the thigh. We're making it. We're making a covenant. We're making an oath verse three and four This is the oath you're making under you know under god's sight, right? You're not going to allow isek to marry one from this area, but you're going to go to my country my kindred You're going to take a wife for my son isek and then we see this doubt creep in which is again very natural, right? and You're making it oath, you know very serious oath in front of god and man. I mean it's no it's this isn't this isn't a little thing and he doesn't want, you know, I don't know exactly the cultural significance, but oftentimes you see in the bible this idea of recompense, right like You know if I don't do this let the fate fall on me I think of an example of like the isra the israelite spies, you know and um we have uh Rahab it took me a minute had to kind of boot up the computer here Rahab the harlot hiding them right and they and she says look I've done this thing for you save me because you're serving the real true god She believes in god and they they make an oath or covenant with her And they say like if we don't save you let the same thing happen to us, right like that's the kind of biblical Example there's many of them there that we need to You know be careful when we make oaths of course the the bible says we shouldn't you know I think in the new testament we shouldn't shouldn't make an oath our yay should be yay or nay should be nay the idea is that we simply like everything that we Say is true or we commit to and so forth. There's no need for an oath because we're honest christians We're we're there. We have no like shadiness about us. We've we're not trying to do anything bad We're just simply you know If I tell you i'm there at three o'clock, you know unless i'm basically incapacitated i'll be there at three o'clock, right, you know if I tell you You know, then um, we're gonna mow the lawn saturday We're gonna mow the lawn saturday, you know like that your word should be your word But in the old times they made these oaths and these oaths were very serious Um, and I can think of some examples Think of the one where they went out to war and and it was about killing his own daughter You know or something killing the first person he saw or something crazy And there was some debate where they had to kill his daughter or not Uh, let me look that up real quick. Yep. There it is Jay pith from judges 11 He's asked to deliver the israelites And he makes an oath and says if you give me if you give me these sons of them on and hey Whatever comes out my door. I'm gonna give it to you that judges 11 30 31 Ends up being his daughter and then there's some debate whether he had to actually offer his daughter or not Um, but oaths are very very serious. And so there's doubt here. There's there's doubt There's unbelief and we all face this I think if we're honest, right? And so the idea here is that Um, number one. God is very reasonable and you'll see Uh, I think in, um, maybe the next episode or two How reasonable God is in dealing with this particular doubt or issue But at the same time it underscores Just, you know, if you think of the scenario leasor is is it is in charge? You know the senior Servant the one in charge of everything is surely seen so much Of god's blessing in the household seen god move so much You know who's to say he didn't go fight with abraham when he went to go rescue lot from the kings Who's to say that he didn't see male kizadek affirm abraham and uh bless abraham or you know He didn't see pharaoh or or or uh, bimilek king of garar blessing abraham He didn't see all of these blessings. Surely he saw the birth of isek and surely he knew that abraham had to take him to mount moriah And potentially sacrifice him but god provided the ram, you know All of these things all these miraculous movements of god and here he is in verse five saying what if this doesn't work out You know that is the human nature like You are with father abraham you have seen god move and move and move and move And here we have the very first thing he says, uh, excuse me abraham What if this doesn't go according to plan because i'm making an oath which is basically my life here My hands under your thigh. What if this doesn't exactly pan out And that is just something baked into us which for timesake We're going to talk more about in the next episode how we deal with this lack of faith tune in then. Thank you for listening so much Take care. God bless and amen Thanks for listening to kjv cafe and we'll see you at the cafe tomorrow