Meditate

26. Isaac and Abimelech

Isaac and Abimelech

26

Now there was a famine in the land, besides the former famine that had occurred in the days of Abraham. And Isaac went to Gerar, to King Abimelech of the Philistines.²The Lord appeared to Isaac and said, “Do not go down to Egypt; settle in the land that I shall show you.³Reside in this land as an alien, and I will be with you, and will bless you; for to you and to your descendants I will give all these lands, and I will fulfill the oath that I swore to your father Abraham.⁴I will make your offspring as numerous as the stars of heaven, and will give to your offspring all these lands; and all the nations of the earth shall gain blessing for themselves through your offspring,⁵because Abraham obeyed my voice and kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws.”

⁶ So Isaac settled in Gerar.⁷When the men of the place asked him about his wife, he said, “She is my sister”; for he was afraid to say, “My wife,” thinking, “or else the men of the place might kill me for the sake of Rebekah, because she is attractive in appearance.”⁸When Isaac had been there a long time, King Abimelech of the Philistines looked out of a window and saw him fondling his wife Rebekah.⁹So Abimelech called for Isaac, and said, “So she is your wife! Why then did you say, ‘She is my sister’?” Isaac said to him, “Because I thought I might die because of her.”¹⁰Abimelech said, “What is this you have done to us? One of the people might easily have lain with your wife, and you would have brought guilt upon us.”¹¹So Abimelech warned all the people, saying, “Whoever touches this man or his wife shall be put to death.”

¹² Isaac sowed seed in that land, and in the same year reaped a hundredfold. The Lord blessed him,¹³and the man became rich; he prospered more and more until he became very wealthy.¹⁴He had possessions of flocks and herds, and a great household, so that the Philistines envied him.¹⁵(Now the Philistines had stopped up and filled with earth all the wells that his father’s servants had dug in the days of his father Abraham.)¹⁶And Abimelech said to Isaac, “Go away from us; you have become too powerful for us.”

¹⁷ So Isaac departed from there and camped in the valley of Gerar and settled there.¹⁸Isaac dug again the wells of water that had been dug in the days of his father Abraham; for the Philistines had stopped them up after the death of Abraham; and he gave them the names that his father had given them.¹⁹But when Isaac’s servants dug in the valley and found there a well of spring water,²⁰the herders of Gerar quarreled with Isaac’s herders, saying, “The water is ours.” So he called the well Esek, because they contended with him.²¹Then they dug another well, and they quarreled over that one also; so he called it Sitnah.²²He moved from there and dug another well, and they did not quarrel over it; so he called it Rehoboth, saying, “Now the Lord has made room for us, and we shall be fruitful in the land.”

²³ From there he went up to Beer-sheba.²⁴And that very night the Lord appeared to him and said, “I am the God of your father Abraham; do not be afraid, for I am with you and will bless you and make your offspring numerous for my servant Abraham’s sake.”²⁵So he built an altar there, called on the name of the Lord, and pitched his tent there. And there Isaac’s servants dug a well.

²⁶ Then Abimelech went to him from Gerar, with Ahuzzath his adviser and Phicol the commander of his army.²⁷Isaac said to them, “Why have you come to me, seeing that you hate me and have sent me away from you?”²⁸They said, “We see plainly that the Lord has been with you; so we say, let there be an oath between you and us, and let us make a covenant with you²⁹so that you will do us no harm, just as we have not touched you and have done to you nothing but good and have sent you away in peace. You are now the blessed of the Lord.”³⁰So he made them a feast, and they ate and drank.³¹In the morning they rose early and exchanged oaths; and Isaac set them on their way, and they departed from him in peace.³²That same day Isaac’s servants came and told him about the well that they had dug, and said to him, “We have found water!”³³He called it Shibah; therefore the name of the city is Beer-sheba to this day.

Esau’s Hittite Wives

³⁴ When Esau was forty years old, he married Judith daughter of Beeri the Hittite, and Basemath daughter of Elon the Hittite;³⁵and they made life bitter for Isaac and Rebekah.

7. Struggling With Sin

¹³ Did what is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin, working death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin, and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure.

The Inner Conflict

¹⁴ For we know that the law is spiritual; but I am of the flesh, sold into slavery under sin.¹⁵I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.¹⁶Now if I do what I do not want, I agree that the law is good.¹⁷But in fact it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells within me.¹⁸For I know that nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh. I can will what is right, but I cannot do it.¹⁹For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do.²⁰Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells within me.

38. Psalm 38

Psalm 38

A Penitent Sufferer’s Plea for Healing

A Psalm of David, for the memorial offering.

1

O Lord, do not rebuke me in your anger,

or discipline me in your wrath.

2

For your arrows have sunk into me,

and your hand has come down on me.

3

There is no soundness in my flesh

because of your indignation;

there is no health in my bones

because of my sin.

4

For my iniquities have gone over my head;

they weigh like a burden too heavy for me.

5

My wounds grow foul and fester

because of my foolishness;

6

I am utterly bowed down and prostrate;

all day long I go around mourning.

7

For my loins are filled with burning,

and there is no soundness in my flesh.

8

I am utterly spent and crushed;

I groan because of the tumult of my heart.

9

O Lord, all my longing is known to you;

my sighing is not hidden from you.

10

My heart throbs, my strength fails me;

as for the light of my eyes—it also has gone from me.

11

My friends and companions stand aloof from my affliction,

and my neighbors stand far off.

12

Those who seek my life lay their snares;

those who seek to hurt me speak of ruin,

and meditate treachery all day long.

13

But I am like the deaf, I do not hear;

like the mute, who cannot speak.

14

Truly, I am like one who does not hear,

and in whose mouth is no retort.

15

But it is for you, O Lord, that I wait;

it is you, O Lord my God, who will answer.

16

For I pray, “Only do not let them rejoice over me,

those who boast against me when my foot slips.”

17

For I am ready to fall,

and my pain is ever with me.

18

I confess my iniquity;

I am sorry for my sin.

19

Those who are my foes without cause are mighty,

and many are those who hate me wrongfully.

20

Those who render me evil for good

are my adversaries because I follow after good.

21

Do not forsake me, O Lord;

O my God, do not be far from me;

22

make haste to help me,

O Lord, my salvation.