Week 7

10/20/2024

Fall 2024

Central Passage: Genesis 24-25

Notice the number of times the phrase steadfast love occurs in chapter 24. If you’re not reading the ESV, other versions translate the word as kindness, lovingkindness, or faithfulness. The four-time repetition of this Hebrew word, chesed, ought to draw our attention to its presence throughout the narrative. Chesed is not simply emotional love or offering niceties to someone. It is an enduring, faithful (and often covenantal) faithfulness to someone. It can describe long-term commitments people make to one another, such as the marriage covenant. It seems fitting that a chapter about marriage should be permeated with this theme of chesed, both from God and between people. Furthermore, the servant’s response to abundant chesed was worship; note how many times the servant responded in worship to chesed that originated with God’s faithful promise-keeping.

Without needing to dwell on marrying from your kin, we might also question cultures with arranged marriages (there are benefits and drawbacks to systems with arranged marriages as well as ours). But within this context, note how God faithfully kept His oath to Abraham in Genesis 22:17 (compare Rebekah’s blessing in Genesis 24:60 to Genesis 22:17). Priests in Israel would often cast lots to determine the will of God in a binary yes/no scenario, and Abraham’s servant used a similar principle with the drink test in Genesis 24:14-21. It would have been commonly hospitable to offer a stranger a drink, but it would have been uncommonly courteous to provide a drink for his camels as well. On top of that, God made His answer even more unambiguous by having Rebekah arrive on the scene “before he had finished speaking” (Genesis 24:15).

God further clarified His choosing of Rebekah by her agreeing to leave her kinsmen immediately. In ancient Near Eastern culture, a duration of time, such as ten days, would have been customary in order for the bride’s family to ensure that their daughter would be joining a trustworthy and advantageous family. The groom’s family often supplied gifts (1) to the bride to betroth her to his family and (2) to the family to demonstrate the groom’s family’s wealth and desirability for marriage. So, after Rebekah and her family received the gifts and the servant requested her immediate departure, Rebekah’s family consulted with her. Though under normal circumstances, no such consultation would have taken place, the immediacy of the request warranted her affirmation.

We may be tempted to cast lots or provide similar oracles/tests to determine God’s will. He may even graciously answer such things. But we have received the full counsel of His will in Scripture that guides us to wise decision-making. Such oracle tests often come from a place of unbelief. Consider how Gideon received direct word from God assuring his victory over the Midianites, yet he felt that he needed to do a fleece test because he doubted God’s word. Tests like this often do not placate the underlying insecurity in these situations. Instead, this insecurity demonstrates faithlessness in response to God’s revealed character and actions in His word. Genesis 24 shows the opposite mindset for Abraham’s servant: when he noticed God’s faithfulness on display, he worshipped. God answered clearly by revealing His will and blessing through Rebekah’s presence, peculiar hospitality, and immediate response. God’s chesed on display warrants worship from the faithful.