Guided By God

Gen 24:1-27 Guided by God ES 16 Feb 14 1534

This is our experience, if you honour the Lord and seek Him with all your heart.

Gen 24 records the story of how God guided Abraham’s servant to find a wife for his son Isaac. [Read Gen 24:1-9]

God will surely guide us to where He wants us to go, but first we must obey what He has already revealed.

FOLLOW WHAT GOD HAS CLEARLY REVEALED

Two things Abraham knew for sure and would not compromise:

(1) He will not get a wife for his son among the Canaanites

• Deut 7:3-4 “Do not intermarry with them. Do not give your daughters to their sons or take their daughters for your sons, 4for they will turn your sons away from following me to serve other gods, and the LORD's anger will burn against you and will quickly destroy you.” This is God’s will.

• 2 Cor 6:14 “Do not be yoked together with unbelievers. For what do righteousness and wickedness have in common? Or what fellowship can light have with darkness?”

(2) Isaac is not to go back to where they came from

• Abraham said in verse 7 that the Lord promised him on oath to give his offspring this land. This is God’s will.

• The servant asked, “What if the woman is unwilling to come back, shall I just take Isaac and go over?”

Abraham’s response was firm. God’s will was for us to settle in this Promised Land!

• Verse 8 he said to his servant, “If the woman is unwilling to come back with you, then you will be released from this oath of mine. Only do not take my son back there."

• If you failed to get the woman back, you would be released from this responsibility.

• But even if this should happen, “you are not to take my son back there.”

Boundaries were set because Abraham knows God’s will. No compromise, whatsoever.

• We don’t bend God’s will to suit our convenience. We change our options to go with God’s will. We keep to God’s will and let the other pieces fall where they are.

• Whatever the outcome, Abraham was prepared not to compromise on God’s will.

Follow what God has clearly revealed. Don’t compromise God’s Word when it comes to finding your lifetime partner.

• I am not trying to scare you. I’m just restating what is plainly spoken in God’s Word.

• You are going to pay a price, if that is the choice you have made.

TRUST GOD TO GUIDE YOU

Look at what Abraham said. Verse 7: “He will send his angel before you so that you can get a wife for my son from there.”

• Even though there was this uncertainty, Abraham chose to trust God. It was a declaration of faith that God will provide.

• He was speaking from experience. He left his home in Ur and eventually came to this Promised Land because God guided him.

If you want God to guide you (which He surely will), then declare your TRUST in God.

• Prov 3:5-6 “Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; 6 in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight.” [direct your paths; make straight your paths; show you the right path.]

• The issue is not with God’s unwillingness to guide us, but our unwillingness to trust Him.

• We often say, WHAT IF. What if I can’t find this woman; what if she does not want to follow me back. We are subtly giving ourselves the chance to compromise.

• Instead, let us say the positive with faith – God will help me find the woman, he will guide me; she will follow me back because God will provide.

What God has revealed, don’t ask. What He has yet to reveal, just trust.

• Trust is necessary because without that you cannot commit. You cannot commit to someone whom you cannot trust.

• This was what Abraham did. He chose to trust God to providentially provide a wife for Isaac, even though that was extremely difficult.

His confidence was based upon God’s revealed Word – if they are not supposed to intermarry with the locals and to go back to his native land (stay in the Promised Land Canaan), then God must surely provide.

• It’s almost like telling God: “If that is what You want, then You must provide the way!” It is a trust that God will provide what He wants.

• God honours those who honours Him (cf. 1 Sam 2:30). God honours the one who trusts Him.

Abraham believes God even thought this whole idea was exceptionally difficult.

• What are the chances that his servant can travel 800km, meet a qualified woman from his own clan, and convince her and her family to let her travel to a distant and marry a man she has never met?