Isaac and Rebekah
24: 1-67
We have come to a major break in this second division of Genesis. The first division (1:1 to 11:9) deals with four great events, the Creation, the Fall, the Flood and the Table of Nations. The second division (11:10 to 50:26) deals with four great men, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph. We have just learned about Abraham, the man of faith. Now, in the next three chapters, we will learn about Isaac, the son of promise. There are three great events in his life and we have already seen two of them. The first was his birth, and the second was his being sacrificed as a sin offering by Avraham. The third is the finding of a bride.379
After the mourning period for Sarah was finished, Abraham set out to find a suitable wife for his son Isaac. Thus, while we read about the first Jewish burial in Chapter 23, we learn about the first Jewish wedding in Chapter 24. It will not be easy to obtain a wife for Isaac in a way that will preserve the covenant requirements. Abraham has not yet become a great nation. Survival hangs by a thread. But once again we see God’s ability to overcome obstacles and to fulfill His promises.380 He sends his chief servant back to the land of Haran in Mesopotamia to find a suitable bride, and we will see his success in finding Rebekah. This is a very wonderful love story, but it also records a very important episode in the history of man’s salvation. Since Isaac is a type of Messiah, according to the B’rit Chadashah, it is not surprising that there are many fascinating parallels between the story of Isaac’s search for a bride, through the ministry of his father’s chief servant, and the Ruach being sent out for the purpose of taking from the Gentiles a people for Himself (Acts 15:14), a bride for Messiah (2 Cor 11:2).381
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