Preacher: George Johnson
Water wells play a large part in today’s study, spoiler alert, these wells represent a spiritual connection in each of us with the Holy Spirit. Pay close attention how Isaac re-digging these wells brings life back to each region. Our wells can go spiritually dry. Please never walk away from your faith foolishly thinking, “that didn’t work”. We re-dig, our dry wells by moving closer in the Word, we seek God for that first love we once had. God hasn’t changed, He still and always will love us no matter how foolish we act…
The story starts out with a famine in the land. Though Isaac lived in the land God promised to his father Abraham and his descendants, it did not mean that life in the land would be without trouble or challenges. That’s as well for us as Christians today. Just because we are believers this is not a guarantee that everything is going to be good now. This is where many new Believers fall. Many came to the Lord Jesus because their life situation is so bad, (mostly due to their own bad decisions, “but not all”) For some they were dealt a bad hand, good people in tough situations. It could be health or financial or a child that goes completely off the charts crazy. What is God promising? We went over a whole list last week, get the notes. He said, I’ll be with you, I’ll send the Helper to comfort you, you’ll never have to go through anything like this again, “alone”. Just because you’re a Christian now, does not mean your life is going to be a bed of roses, remember roses have thorns. What I am saying, when you have the spirit of God living in you, you make better decisions. Better decisions mean better life, I didn’t say necessarily easier, but better.
- We’re going to see Isaac make some of the very same mistakes Abraham made. The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.
- Because of an everlasting Covenant God made with Himself and by Himself, He never left or gave up on either Abraham or Isaac anymore then He would ever leave or give up on you because you make mistakes. These stories are proof of God’s Grace for us.
Genesis 26 New King James Version
1 There was a famine in the land, besides the first famine that was in the days of Abraham. And Isaac went to Abimelech king of the Philistines, in Gerar.
2 Then the Lord appeared to him and said: “Do not go down to Egypt; live in the land of which I shall tell you.
- Isaac began to go south towards Egypt, as Abram did in famine (Genesis 12:10). It seems that Isaac thought to travel along the famous road between Egypt and Canaan that went along the Mediterranean Sea. Gerar was the same place where Isaac’s father Abraham met another Abimelech.
3 Dwell in this land, and I will be with you and bless you; for to you and your descendants I give all these lands, and I will perform the oath which I swore to Abraham your father.
- As Isaac journeyed south, God warned him not to go any further. Isaac was to always live in the land that God told him to live in. The Son of Promise was always to live in the land of promise; if Isaac did, God promised to be with him and to bless him.
4 And I will make your descendants multiply as the stars of heaven; I will give to your descendants all these lands; and in your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed;
5 because Abraham obeyed My voice and kept My charge, My commandments, My statutes, and My laws.”
6 So Isaac dwelt in Gerar.
GENESIS 26:7-8
7 And the men of the place asked about his wife. And he said, “She is my sister”; for he was afraid to say, “She is my wife,” because he thought, “lest the men of the place kill me for Rebekah, because she is beautiful to behold.”
- Isaac reacted to fear as his father had done. He misrepresented his wife as his sister to the men of Gerar. It is the sad story of a father’s weakness being repeated in his son. When the deceit was exposed and rebuked, Isaac confessed. Confession leads to blessing.
- Isaac becomes wealthy in Gerar—so wealthy that the Abimelech who was then reigning asked him to leave. So, Isaac moved from Gerar to the Valley of Gerar, not far away.
8 Now it came to pass, when he had been there a long time, that Abimelech king of the Philistines looked through a window, and saw, and there was Isaac, showing endearment to Rebekah his wife.
GENESIS 26:9-15
9 Then Abimelech called Isaac and said, “Quite obviously she is your wife; so how could you say, ‘She is my sister’?” Isaac said to him, “Because I said, ‘Lest I die on account of her.’ ”
10 And Abimelech said, “What is this you have done to us? One of the people might soon have lain with your wife, and you would have brought guilt on us.”
11 So Abimelech charged all his people, saying, “He who touches this man or his wife shall surely be put to death.”
12 Then Isaac sowed in that land, and reaped in the same year a hundredfold; and the Lord blessed him.
13 The man began to prosper, and continued prospering until he became very prosperous;
14 for he had possessions of flocks and possessions of herds and a great number of servants. So, the Philistines envied him.
- During his sojourn in that district, he farmed a piece of land, which, by the blessing of God on his skill and industry, was very productive and by his plentiful returns he increased so rapidly in wealth and influence that the Philistines, afraid and envious of his prosperity, obliged him to leave the place. This may receive illustration from the fact that many Syrian shepherds in this day settle for a year or two in a place, rent some ground, in the produce of which they trade with the neighboring market, till the owners, through jealousy of their growing substance, refuse to renew their lease and compel them to remove elsewhere.
15 Now the Philistines had stopped up all the wells which his father’s servants had dug in the days of Abraham, his father, and they had filled them with earth.
- This shows the Philistines are afraid and envious of his prosperity so they chocked the wells with sand and rocks. Remember there’s a drought…
16 And Abimelech said to Isaac, “Go away from us, for you are much mightier than we.”
17 Then Isaac departed from there and pitched his tent in the Valley of Gerar, and dwelt there.
GENESIS 26:18-21
18 And Isaac dug again the wells of water which they had dug in the days of Abraham his father, for the Philistines had stopped them up after the death of Abraham. He called them by the names which his father had called them.
- The naming of wells by Abraham, and the hereditary right of his family to the property, the change of the names by the Philistines to obliterate the traces of their origin, the restoration of the names by Isaac, and the contests between the respective shepherds to the exclusive possession of the water, are circumstances that occur among the natives in those regions as frequently in the present day as in the time of Isaac.
- Using this as a spiritual illustration, we might say that the wells of peace, of power, of grace, of wisdom, of transformation are all available for the believer today as they were for previous generations. The question is whether the present generation will have the faith, the work, and the commitment to dig the wells again.
19 Also Isaac’s servants dug in the valley, and found a well of running water there.
20 But the herdsmen of Gerar quarreled with Isaac’s herdsmen, saying, “The water is ours.” So, he called the name of the well Esek, because they quarreled with him.
- “Esek” primarily refers to a Hebrew biblical term meaning “contention,” “strife,” or “quarrel,” to describe a well over which Isaac’s herdsmen argued with the people of Gerar. It symbolizes a period of conflict or opposition before finding peace
21 Then they dug another well, and they quarreled over that one also. So he called its name Sitnah.
- Sitnah is a Hebrew word meaning “enmity,” “hatred,” “opposition,” or “accusation”.
GENESIS 26:22-27
22 And he moved from there and dug another well, and they did not quarrel over it. So he called its name Rehoboth, because he said, “For now the Lord has made room for us, and we shall be fruitful in the land.”
- Rehoboth is a Hebrew term meaning “broad places,” “spacious,” or “room,” symbolizing a place of prosperity and freedom from conflict.
23 Then he went up from there to Beersheba.
- Isaac saw these wells as they rightly were, the blessing of God. He saw them more as God’s gracious blessing than the result of his hard work.
- Then he went up from there to Beersheba: God used the conflicts to lead Isaac back to Beersheba, where Abraham had been before. Because God repeatedly demonstrated His faithfulness to Isaac, he knew that he could be blessed and fruitful wherever God led him (we shall be fruitful in the land)
24 And the Lord appeared to him the same night and said, “I am the God of your father Abraham; do not fear, for I am with you. I will bless you and multiply your descendants for My servant Abraham’s sake.”
- Isaac’s father Abraham had many personal appearances of the LORD. This seems to be the first such experience for Isaac.
25 So he built an altar there and called on the name of the Lord, and he pitched his tent there; and there Isaac’s servants dug a well.
- In the atmosphere of greater contention between Isaac’s herdsmen and the Philistine herdsmen, Isaac had reason to be afraid. Here, God told Isaac to put any such fears away.
26 Then Abimelech came to him from Gerar with Ahuzzath, one of his friends, and Phichol the commander of his army.
27 And Isaac said to them, “Why have you come to me, since you hate me and have sent me away from you?”
- Isaac’s question was logical. He was pushed out of Gerar by the contention of the herdsmen of Gerar. He had every reason to believe he was not welcome — and he went towards Beersheba.
GENESIS 26:28-33
28 But they said, “We have certainly seen that the Lord is with you. So, we said, ‘Let there now be an oath between us, between you and us; and let us make a covenant with you,
- Abimelech gave a surprising response. He and others could see that the covenant God, Yahweh, was with Isaac and had blessed him. He came to ask for peace and a blessing from Isaac, this wonderfully blessed man, because he knew that God was with him, and that you are now the blessed of the LORD. Can anyone in your world see you have the blessing of God on you?
29 that you will do us no harm, since we have not touched you, and since we have done nothing to you but good and have sent you away in peace. You are now the blessed of the Lord.’ ”
30 So he made them a feast, and they ate and drank.
- We see the tremendous practical wisdom of Isaac’s actions. He didn’t respond to evil with more evil, and he sought God’s provision along the pattern of ancient ways. They cut a covenant. We can only assume this was the same type of covenant ceremony in Genesis 15, where they sacrificed animals cutting them into two halves and walking through the blood saying their oaths to one another.
31 Then they arose early in the morning and swore an oath with one another; and Isaac sent them away, and they departed from him in peace.
32 It came to pass the same day that Isaac’s servants came and told him about the well which they had dug, and said to him, “We have found water.”
- God brought many blessings to Isaac at once. He enjoyed a rich season of blessing.
- Abraham was a man of altars, and Jacob would be a man of tents. Isaac was a man of wells, and he knew God’s constant provision. He knew by experience God could provide in many different ways, not just one.
33 So he called it Shebah. Therefore the name of the city is Beersheba to this day.
- Shebah (or Shibah) is a Hebrew name and term, predominantly found in the Bible here (Genesis 26:33), meaning “oath,” “seven,” or “promise”. It refers to the well named by Isaac, which symbolized a covenant or oath of peace, and is the origin of the city name Beershebah.
34 When Esau was forty years old, he took as wives Judith the daughter of Beeri the Hittite, and Basemath the daughter of Elon the Hittite.
35 And they were a grief of mind to Isaac and Rebekah.
- Esau, the son of Isaac and twin brother of Jacob, went against the pattern established by Abraham, that his descendants should not marry the women of Canaan (Genesis 24:3-4).
- This shows Esau’s character as a fornicator and profane person (Hebrews 12:16)
Hebrews 12:16 New King James Version
16 lest there be any fornicator or profane person like Esau, who for one morsel of food sold his birthright.
“Apostasy”
a·pos·ta·sy noun
the abandonment or re-nunc-iation of a religious or political belief.
- Apostasy is closely linked with immorality. A professing Christian may fall into gross moral sin. Instead of acknowledging his guilt, he blames the Lord and falls away. Apostasy and sexual sin are connected in 2 Peter 2:10, 14, 18 and Jude 8, 16, 18.
- Finally, apostasy is a form of irreligion, illustrated by Esau. He had no real appreciation for the birthright; he willingly bartered it for the momentary gratification of his appetite.