I had an interesting download/revelation today, we had the Bible on CD playing and as I was walking through Genesis 24 was playing with the story of Abraham sending his servant off ‘back home’ to find a wife for Isaac. It is where the servant waits at the well and then a beautiful young girl (Rebekah) comes out and gets him a drink and then voluntarily also gets water for his 10 camels.
The servants task was to Gen 24:4“Go to my homeland, to my relatives, and find a wife there for my son Isaac”. As I was listening to the story the response of Rebekah’s family shocked me. ‘ v50 Then Laban and Bethuel replied, “The Lord has obviously brought you here, so what can we say? 51 Here is Rebekah; take her and go. Yes, let her be the wife of your master’s son, as the Lord has directed.” ‘
It struck me that the servant had found people of ‘Faith’ they obviously knew the Lord and were at a point in their journey with Him that if they discerned that something was of God then they would do it. Even to the extent of allowing their daughter to leave with this stranger! Suddenly heaps of thoughts ran through my brain. We all knew that Abram/Abraham was asked by God to: Gen 12:1 “Leave your country, your relatives, and your father’s house, and go to the land that I will show you.” I knew that Abram was obviously a person of Faith that he responded and left everything behind him and went, but I didn’t know that there was an established/ongoing community of faith back there in Ur. What a shock not only had the servant been led by God back to his masters family but that they were people of Faith that recognised the work of God and instantly surrendered to it. Wow.
My heart ached at this point as now for so long Helen & I have been longing for people to respond in a similar way to the vision of Tabernacle that we have been given by God. “The Lord has obviously brought you here, so what can we say? 51 Here is Rebekah; take her and go. Yes, let her be the wife of your master’s son, as the Lord has directed.” I suppose what we have been looking for is along the lines of ‘This is obviously of God’ ‘ The Lord has been revealing similar things to me, I will join with you in the pursuit of all that God is wanting to reveal here at this time. Actually we have had several people say to us the first part ‘This is obviously of God’ but our hearts long for the day when the right people will also say ‘I will join with you, I will make this what I do’. Please pray with us for the release of Rebekah’s who will leave all, that they will come with us to an unknown destiny to see God release ALL that He wants to release through TABERNACLE.
I have again just looked at the text and I see that soon after when Abraham’s servant was wanting to leave the family said, 24:55 “But we want Rebekah to stay at least ten days,” her brother and mother said. “Then she can go.” This is so interesting, its like the ‘rubber was starting to hit the road’ they were going to miss Rebekah, there was great cost here. The servants response was 56 “Don’t hinder my return. The Lord has made my mission successful, and I want to report back to my master.” So they then asked Rebekah and she was willing to go straight away.
I wonder what would have happened to this story if they had waited 10 days? Would it have changed the story? After ‘thinking’ about it would the family have decided the cost was too great and not allowed Rebekah to go? ‘She has this to do first! We wanted to do this as well. This is scary what will happen? Can you guarantee to me what will happen?’ It makes me think of ‘instant obedience’ to the word of God. Not theorising it or strategising it, but surrendering and submitting to the word of God and Obeying it. Not because we understand it or can see how it would work out, but because we believe the words to be from God and therefore we trust Him and do it whether we understand them and their consequences or not. That I believe is the true definition of Faith.