Isaac

Rodney Gehman « Gen 23-36 « April 12, 2026

[ 000 ] Welcome/Intro

Good morning, River City!

If we haven’t had the chance to meet yet, my name is Rodney and I am one of the pastors around here. Thank you for being here this morning. Before you sit down, KidCity teachers and students can head back to your classes, and the rest of you can take a few minutes to say good morning to the person next to you, grab a refill on your coffee, and so we’ll go from there.

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This week I was watching a video where Wesley Huff, who is a very well-spoken biblical historian, was explaining the gospel to his interviewer, and he told a story that I thought was very fitting for our sermon series.

The story begins with a lovely young woman named Betty who is a botanist at a biology lab, where she studies plants and how they function and what medicinal uses they may have, and so on. And she spends an entire weekend in the lab studying this botanical specimen that her lab assistant Jerry had dropped off for her. And when Jerry showed up on Monday morning, he found Betty just as excited as excited can be. She said, Jerry – thank you so much for the botanical specimen you gave me on Friday! It’s incredible. The more I study it the more I find out about this incredible chemical composition, the biological components I’ve extrapolated from the specimen are just amazing – there are so many medical opportunities here, and things we can extract from this specimen for fragrances and all kinds of things – thank you so much! This is amazing!

And Jerry looks at her and says, Betty… Friday was Valentine’s day, and I gave you a long-stemmed rose. Do you understand the implications of what I gave you?

Now Betty understood the flower as a botanical specimen better than most people would. She clearly understood “what” she was looking at. But she completely missed the “why” and the meaning behind it.

For the past several weeks, we have been in this series from the book of [ 001 ] Genesis called Promises and Patriarchs, reading about the life of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph. And we can get all into the details of who did what and said what, and where they lived, and this that and the other. But just like Jerry was trying to communicate something to Betty through that long stemmed rose, God is trying to communicate something to us in these pages, and our task as we open the Word, whether it’s in our morning quiet times, or our Bible-reading plans, or with your small groups, or here on Sunday mornings it to not just read the words and get the details, but to rely on the Holy Spirit to help us understand what God is communicating to us through the scriptures.

We have FOUR stops today:

We’ll start in Gen 23 and say goodbye to Sarah and then Abraham.

Then we’ll see God’s wisdom and sovereignty in action.

We’ll look at the topic of generational sin as we watch Isaac follow in his dad’s footstep.

And we’ll wrap things up with God renewing the blessing to Isaac and his response to that.

You’ll want to have a Bible with you today. Again, we have too many verses to cover to put them all on the screen, but let’s pray once more, and then dive in.

PRAYER

23 Now Sarah lived 127 years; these were all the years of her life. 2 Sarah died in Kiriath-arba (that is, Hebron) in the land of Canaan, and Abraham went in to mourn for Sarah and to weep for her. And in the following verses of chapter 23, you can read the story of how Abraham secures a burial plot for her. And as odd as that may seem, it’s kind of interesting that the first piece of the promised land that Abraham actually owns is a cemetery. God has promised him the land that is modern day Israel, Palestine, even into Iraq and Saudi Arabia, and the first part of it that actually becomes his possession is a cemetery – the somewhat chilling reminder that he won’t be here to see the fulfillment of God’s promise.

Two weeks ago, I preached on Vision Sunday about all the things God has put on our hearts, in terms of future opportunities for ministry in Riverside and the surrounding communities. And yet, I drove home that afternoon, and thought, hmm. What if this vision isn’t something we won’t see in our lifetime? What if we work toward it for our entire lives, we get into a new building, but it’s the 2-3 year olds back in KidCity right now who are going to be the leaders that get to see this Vision in its fullness? I thought, well, if that’s a very real possibility, then

Let’s make sure we raise those kids up to be serious about loving Jesus, first of all. And then, b) How can we set them up well?

That’s what Abraham sees as his next assignment. He knows he won’t be here to see the fulfillment of everything God promised, so how can he set up Isaac well? After he buried his wife, chapter 24 says he pulled aside one of his most trusted servants, and told them in verse 3, “please swear by Yahweh, the God of heaven and earth that you will not take a wife for my son from anyone around here, but go back to the land God called me from and get a wife for my son Isaac.” We have to have a good wife for Isaac.

Why is this important? Remember what the local girls, the Canaanites, do with their children? At least some of them? They sacrifice their children to their gods because they think it’ll help the chances of their prayers being answered! The implication here is that, look, if God’s going to make our family into a great nation, we can’t have Isaac marrying one of the locals, and then offering their child as a sacrifice – that would destroy the family that is supposed to be a blessing to all the peoples on earth!

And in the rest of chapter 24, it’s a pretty cool story of God’s sovereignty over even the smallest of details as the servant travels back to Abraham’s relatives, and miraculously, God provides a wife for Isaac. It’s a really cool story – I encourage you to read it this afternoon after lunch.

After he gave Isaac everything he owned, the author fast forwards the story and tells us Abraham died old and contented at 175 years old, joining Sarah in the cemetery he had purchased.

[ 002 ] Chapter 25:20 Isaac was forty years old when he took Rebekah as his wife… 21 Isaac prayed to the LORD on behalf of his wife because she was childless. Sounds familiar doesn’t it? The Lord was receptive to his prayer, and his wife Rebekah conceived. Isaac was 40 when he got married, and verse 26 tells he was 60 when the kids were born. Abraham and Sarah waited over 25 years for the Lord to give her a child, and now Isaac and Rebekah wait another 20. That’s at least 45-50 years of nothing, and the whole time, God has the ability to open their womb with just one word.

Why is it so important that we know who was childless and who wasn’t? Why is it so important that the Bible tells us how long these couples prayed to have children before God allowed them to conceive? I don’t know all of God’s reasons, because his understanding is so far beyond my own. But one of the reasons we can be sure of is that God is not in a hurry, but neither is he slow the way we think of slowness. Scripture says He is patient. He is kind. He is not in a rush. And secondly, we know God uses these periods of waiting to test his people to show us where our hearts really are.

When Abraham and Sarah had waited 10 years, they decided to pull a slave girl into the mix. But Isaac seems to have been taught by his dad to not do that. Isaac prays. Potentially for all 20 years. He knew God’s promises. He knew they would eventually have a child. It was a guarantee. They had to have children for the promises to be fulfilled in their family tree. They just didn’t know when.

Well, it finally happens, and when Rebekah conceives, verse 22, she eventually notices something unique – it feels like there is more than one child in her womb, and instead of kicking her ribs, it feels like they are kicking each other! And again, in a pattern of prayerfulness and seeking Yahweh, she goes to the Lord to understand, and he answers her.

[ 003 ]23 And the LORD said to her: Two nations are in your womb; two peoples will come from you and be separated. One people will be stronger than the other, and the older will serve the younger.

In the day that Isaac and Rebekah live, this is a bit counter-cultural. In those days, if you’re a firstborn son, you will be the one that carries on your father’s legacy, his property, his land, his servants – the whole deal is coming to you as the oldest as your birthright. So you would get a double dose of the inheritance so you could run the family farm, and you have the right to call the shots on everything dad owns. So when the Lord says “one will be stronger than the other”, everyone would assume, yep, the older one will be more powerful than the younger one, like usual. So it feels a bit backward when the Lord says “the older will serve the younger”. Why would God do that?

I love it when the New Testament reaches back and grabs one of the stories we’re looking at. After Jesus rose from the dead, he spent the next 40 days teaching his disciples how the entire Old Testament pointed to him – and then some of those guys wrote the New Testament! So when you see the NT explaining the OT, there’s a really good chance that someone learned this from Jesus himself or at least learned it from someone who did hear it from Jesus.

So if you flip all the way to Romans 9, Paul says, you know, Abraham went on to have a lot more sons after Isaac, not to mention Ishmael that was born first. But God told Abraham, your offspring will be traced only through Isaac. Why did God choose Isaac and none of the others? Not only that.[ 004 ]V10 …Rebekah conceived children through one man, our father Isaac. For though her sons had not been born yet or done anything good or bad, so that God’s purpose according to election might stand—not from works but from the one who calls—she was told, "The older will serve the younger.”

Why did God choose Isaac? Why did he choose the younger twin instead of the older one? It cannot be based on his skills, his disposition, his intuition, or what he was passionate about. It can’t be because the older son wasn’t cut out to be a leader, or that he didn’t have the drive, or the business sense. It can’t be because the younger twin was a good kid and the older was a jerk – Neither of the sons were born yet. They hadn’t proved themselves worthy or unworthy. All they've done so far is kick each other.

But Romans 9 answers the question, and says God chose the younger son because he wanted to communicate something to us. He’s handing us a long-stemmed red rose that has implications for us. And Paul says in Romans 9:16, God chooses who will be his promised people, not by what they do or don’t do, where they were born or weren’t born – but based on his own sovereign wisdom and his mercy.

That’s great news for you and I who didn’t grow up as part of Abraham’s family tree! Romans 10 says if we confess with our mouth that Jesus is LORD, and believe in our hearts that God raised him from the dead, we will be saved, and never put to shame! Everyone who calls on the name of the LORD will be saved!

That’s also great news for those of us who don’t have our act together! If God only chose the people who did what was right all the time, we’d all be in trouble. But if it depends on his mercy, there’s even hope for that cousin or uncle or coworker or neighbor that seems so hardheaded and stubborn. Or a younger twin who turns out to be a bit of a punk.

Back to Genesis 25 – [ 005 ]When Rebekah’s time came to give birth, there were indeed twins in her womb. 25 The first one came out red-looking, covered with hair like a fur coat, and they named him Esau. In verse 26, the younger son was born holding onto Esau’s heel with his hand, and so they named him “Jacob”, which means “the one who pulls your leg” or “deceiver.” And it’s confirmed that God’s ways are higher than our ways, his understanding higher than ours, because God has decided to make known the riches of his glory to the entire human race through the deceptive and sneaky little brother.

And in verse 27, we see this on full display. [ 006 ]27 When the boys grew up, Esau became an expert hunter, an outdoorsman, but Jacob was a quiet man who stayed at home. Esau wears camo and cowboy boots. He’s hairy, probably very strong – He’s a man’s man. An expert hunter. Where Esau would have watched ESPN, survival shows, and the Outdoor Channel, Jacob watches the Food Network and Extreme Home Makeover. He is the quiet calculating momma’s boy who loves being at home trying new recipes. They should work together well, right? Esau makes the kill, Jacob takes it from there.

[ 007 ]28 Isaac loved Esau because he had a taste for wild game, but Rebekah loved Jacob. No potential problems there, right? 29 Once when Jacob was cooking a stew, Esau came in from the field exhausted. 30 He said to Jacob, “Let me eat some of that red stuff, because I’m exhausted.” And here’s where you gotta watch those quiet ones. If they’re not talkin’, they’re thinking, right? Little brother is cooking up more than just soup. [ 008 ]31 Jacob replied, “First sell me your birthright.”

Sell me the right to get double the inheritance and take over the farm. Sell me the right to be in charge when dad is gone. The only thing Esau can hear is his growling stomach, and says in [ 009 ]verse 32, I’m about to starve to death, so what good is the birthright to me? What does it matter if I get a double portion of the inheritance if I’m dead?! So in his emotional, in the moment, quick-tempered desperation, he sold the birthright for a bowl of soup. He gave up his inheritance to settle his growling stomach.

And once again, this story is interpreted for us by the New Testament. In the middle of a section about not letting bitterness divide a church, the author of Hebrews writes this: [ 010 ] (Hebrews 12:16) “And make sure that there isn’t any immoral or irreverent person like Esau, who sold his birthright in exchange for a single meal.”

And the author of Hebrews 12 pleads with the church, come on guys, don’t throw away the grace of God; don’t throw away the fellowship of believers – Don’t let bitterness steal your birthright and divide you! It’s unholy, even godless, to do something like that!

— underline on the iPad – And if you’re thinking, steal our birthright? What do you mean by that? The author of Hebrews starts his argument back in [ 011 ] Hebrews 1:2, where he says “…God has appointed him (Jesus) heir of all things and made the universe through him.” [ 012 ] Colossians 1:18 picks up the song: “He is also the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he might come to have first place in everything.”

Jesus is the true older brother, who is the heir of all things. He doesn’t get ⅔ of the farm – he gets ALL of it. But check this out – [ 013 ] Titus 3:6–7 “He poured out his Spirit on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior so that, having been justified by his grace, we may become heirs (heirs of what? What’s the inheritance we get? with the hope of eternal life.”

[ 014 ] Galatians 4:7 “So you are no longer a slave but a son, and if a son, then God has made you an heir.”

For those who have been justified by the grace of God, who have been filled abundantly with his Spirit, we are co-heirs with Jesus. We are sons and daughters, sharing in the birthright inheritance of our older brother. You don’t have to steal it. You don’t have to trick anyone to get it. You don’t have to cook him a bowl of soup or climb Mt Everest to get it. It’s a free gift!

If we are in Christ Jesus, we are as welcome in the family of God as Jesus is! And the author of Hebrews pleads with us - don’t pull an Esau and trade all of that for the things of earth that won’t satisfy you any more than a single meal.

John D Rockefeller was the wealthiest man in the early 1900s, and someone asked him one time, Sir, how much money is enough? Does anyone know his answer? One more dollar.

Tom Brady is arguably the greatest quarterback to ever play in the NFL. 7 Super Bowl wins in 10 appearances, and loads of records. In 2019, after winning his 6th Super Bowl, he was asked which Super Bowl was his favorite. His answer was similar to Rockefeller – he said, “My favorite one is the next one.”

We’ve heard this song before in Genesis, haven’t we? Where the things of earth let us down? We’ve already seen that promised lands always have famines. The things we imagine will satisfy our thirsty souls never actually do. We saw it back in Genesis 12, and look at [ 015 ] Chapter 26:1: There was another famine in the land in addition to the one that had occurred in Abraham’s time.

Test number one was waiting to have children. Test number two is a famine in the promised land. And in verse 2: The Lord appeared to Isaac, and passed on the promise to him. Don’t go to Egypt. Stay here, and I will be with you and I will bless you. All of this land I promised to your father will be yours, you’ll have a huge family tree, and all the earth will be blessed by your offspring because your dad listened to me and kept my commands – which is what I want you to do right now, Isaac.

So Isaac stays put right where he is. And just like it did for his father Abraham, one test led to another.

[ 016 ] 7 When the men of the place asked about his wife, he said, “She is my sister,” for he was afraid to say “my wife,” thinking, “The men of the place will kill me on account of Rebekah, for she is a beautiful woman.” 8 When Isaac had been there for some time, Abimelech, king of the Philistines, looked down from the window and was surprised to see Isaac caressing his wife Rebekah. 9 Abimelech sent for Isaac and said, “So she is really your wife! How could you say, ‘She is my sister’?” Isaac answered him, “Because I thought I might die on account of her.” Same words his father Abraham said. 10 Then Abimelech said, “What have you done to us? One of the people could easily have slept with your wife, and you would have brought guilt on us.”

So the twist in the story is that this king of the Philistines, who would eventually be one of Israel’s most powerful enemies, is actually the one behaving properly in the story – NOT the guy in line for the promise of God! The king has a better sexual ethic than a lot of Christians today, while Isaac is pulling the same deceptive stunt, putting his wife in harm's way, that his dad pulled in this same city 100 years earlier.

What happens in one generation often repeats itself in the next. And that can be good. Families can be known for generosity, hospitality, musical ability, athleticism, artistic or creative ability, work ethic, even following the Lord. Families intentionally or accidentally disciple each other, and pass along spoken or unspoken expectations about what is good and acceptable and what makes for a successful life.

But then there is also the kind of intentional or accidental discipleship that is not so good. Something called “generational sin.” It’s not uncommon at all to see sinful patterns repeat across multiple generations, like addictions. Sexual Abuse. Being emotionally absent. Poor marriages. Mistrust of or rebellion against authority. Alcoholism. Being a workaholic. Defining our worth by possessions or education or wealth. Financial insecurity, or the lust for money. Living in fear of everything. Rejecting anything religious. Sex outside of marriage. Anger issues. Cowardice or caution.

Maybe you notice some of those sin patterns in your own family tree like I do. You see some of the same habits in yourself that were in your mom or in your dad or uncles or aunts. And we say things like, you’re a chip off the old block, or the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.

But here’s the beauty of the gospel – your family certainly influenced your past, but it does not determine your future. God determines your future!! What has happened in the past does not have to be what happens in the future. In fact, the most significant language in the New Testament for becoming a follower of Jesus is that of adoption [ 017 ]Ephesians 1:5 “He predestined us to be adopted as sons through Jesus Christ for himself, according to the good pleasure of his will…” It is a radical new beginning.

When a person places their faith and trust in Jesus, they are reborn into a new family, with a redeemed past and a radically different future (Scazzero, 60-61). Those generational chains are broken immediately by the blood of Jesus who became the curse for us (Gal 3:13), we are instantly transferred from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of the Son of God, and we are now free to walk in a new direction, filled with the Spirit of God, a new creation in Christ – the old has gone, the new has come!

But just because the chains are broken doesn’t mean you’ll never struggle with it. Believers have the responsibility to walk forward as children of God, now filled and empowered by the Holy Spirit to put off the old ways of living and put on the new.

So if you notice generational patterns of sin in your own life: [ 018-1 ]

First of all, acknowledge them. Lord, I’m following right along in the footsteps of my uncle. Or my dad. Or my grandmother. Like following someone in deep snow, I’m stepping in the exact footprints they have left for me, and it’s taking me to places I don’t want to be. Acknowledge it. [ 018-2 ]

Secondly, take responsibility for your own choices. If you want to be free of generational sin, you gotta stop playing the victim. Isaac was not forced to follow his father’s actions, and neither are you. You may have inherited a predisposition to sexual sin from your dad or grandpa, but you’re the one clicking the link. You may have inherited anger issues from your mom, but you’re the one raising your voice. You must own the choices you have made, and call it what it is – it’s sin. Rebellion against God’s good, pleasing and perfect will. [ 018-3 ]

Third, believe the gospel! Which is this: By God’s mercy and grace, he has sent Jesus to live, die, and rise so that we would be welcomed into a new family. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just, and will forgive us of those sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. The Holy Spirit is your full time Helper, here to walk with you, to wash you, and make you more like Jesus. [ 018-4 ]

Fourth, do the work. Jesus invites us to follow him in radical discipleship, using words like “Take up your cross.” “Die.” “Crucify the flesh.” In other words, get serious about killing sin. Wouldn’t it be better to go through life with a flip phone and no internet than to have one more generation be addicted to porn? Wouldn’t it be better to go through life only drinking water than to have one more generation lost to alcoholism? In other words – Radical discipleship means don’t throw out the birthright for a single meal that doesn’t satisfy!

And if you’re still stuck on the idea that God only uses the good people of the world and rejects all the bad people, this whole story is going to give you a headache. Because while Isaac, the child of the promise, is falling prey to the generational sin of his dad, Abimelech is actually the more righteous one! [ 019 ]In fact, in verse 11, …Abimelech warned all the people, “Whoever harms this man or his wife will certainly be put to death,” which serves to reaffirm God’s promise to Abraham, that I will bless those who bless you; and those who treat you with contempt, I will curse.

God blessed Isaac so much that the whole nation of Philistines were jealous of how much he had, and they made a treaty with him to ensure that he didn’t try to take them out. [ 020 ]24 and the LORD appeared to him one night and said, “I am the God of your father Abraham. Do not be afraid, for I am with you. I will bless you and multiply your offspring because of my servant Abraham.

I love that last line – I’m going to bless you, not because you have earned it, but because I made a promise to your dad, and I will keep it. Don’t be afraid – I’ll be with you too. I got you. 25 So [Isaac] built an altar there, called on the name of the LORD, and pitched his tent there…

I want to end where Danielle started us today, in Romans 8, because when you read it in light of the story of Isaac and his boys, knowing that God doesn’t choose us because of what we do or don’t do, but because he has a sovereign and good plan for all of human history, it hits a little differently. In these verses, God is handing us a long stemmed red rose, with massive implications for us:

If God is for us, who can be against us! Who can bring an accusation against the people God chooses? Hey, Jacob is a bit of a deceiver. God knows - he didn’t choose him because he was good in the first place! So when Paul says, who can separate us from the love of Christ, he really means it when he says NOTHING! If God chose us by his own mercy, not by anything we’ve done, and he didn’t spare his own Son, but willingly offered him up so that we would be saved, raised him from the dead and seated him at the right hand of God where he intercedes for us right this moment – listen to me – For those who love God, and are led by his Spirit: YOUR SALVATION IS NOT HANGING BY A THREAD! IT’S NOT IN JEOPARDY! Nothing is able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord

SOURCES

Peter Scazzero, Emotionally Healthy Relationships Workbook (Grand Rapids, MI: Harper Resources, 2023)

https://www.gotquestions.org/firstborn-in-the-Bible.html

https://www.gotquestions.org/co-heirs-with-Christ.html