Good evening, and welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the book of Genesis.  Tonight is study #31 of Genesis, chapter 24, and we are going to read Genesis 24:37-49:

And my master made me swear, saying, Thou shalt not take a wife to my son of the daughters of the Canaanites, in whose land I dwell: But thou shalt go unto my father's house, and to my kindred, and take a wife unto my son. And I said unto my master, Peradventure the woman will not follow me. And he said unto me, JEHOVAH, before whom I walk, will send his angel with thee, and prosper thy way; and thou shalt take a wife for my son of my kindred, and of my father's house: Then shalt thou be clear from this my oath, when thou comest to my kindred; and if they give not thee one, thou shalt be clear from my oath. And I came this day unto the well, and said, O JEHOVAH God of my master Abraham, if now thou do prosper my way which I go: Behold, I stand by the well of water; and it shall come to pass, that when the virgin cometh forth to draw water, and I say to her, Give me, I pray thee, a little water of thy pitcher to drink; And she say to me, Both drink thou, and I will also draw for thy camels: let the same be the woman whom JEHOVAH hath appointed out for my master's son. And before I had done speaking in mine heart, behold, Rebekah came forth with her pitcher on her shoulder; and she went down unto the well, and drew water: and I said unto her, Let me drink, I pray thee. And she made haste, and let down her pitcher from her shoulder, and said, Drink, and I will give thy camels drink also: so I drank, and she made the camels drink also. And I asked her, and said, Whose daughter art thou? And she said, The daughter of Bethuel, Nahor's son, whom Milcah bare unto him: and I put the earring upon her face, and the bracelets upon her hands. And I bowed down my head, and worshipped JEHOVAH, and blessed JEHOVAH God of my master Abraham, which had led me in the right way to take my master's brother's daughter unto his son. And now if ye will deal kindly and truly with my master, tell me: and if not, tell me; that I may turn to the right hand, or to the left.

I will stop reading there.  What we have just read concerns Abraham’s servant recounting the events that had transpired from the time Abraham sent him until he met Rebekah at the well and then entered into her father’s house.  It is very close, if not word-for-word, to what we read earlier in this same chapter, but God is going over it again.  You know, God is the author of the Bible.  He is the one that selected the words to put into the Bible, and sometimes certain accounts are very skimpy, and they do not cover much ground.  The Lord may tell us in just one verse about something, and in the next verse a long period of time has already elapsed, but He does not fill in the missing information.  But in this chapter, we not only find a full account, but a doubling of the account.  Of course, God did not have to do it this way and repeat the same information.  We could have read what the servant experienced in the earlier verses, and then he could have been brought into the house to tell his errand, and it could have been summed up in a verse or two, without the need to go into the details again.  But the Lord did so, and this signals to us that this is very important information. 

Historically, we have to admit it does not seem very important.  It was just a mission to find a wife for Abraham’s son Isaac.  And it appears the servant has done that and, historically, it is not that exciting or all that interesting.  Again, this is a big part of the problem with the historical, grammatical, and literal interpretation.  They would leave it to just the giving of these details and the customs of the people at that time, and then maybe a nice moral sermon about marriage, and so forth.  And that would be all, and it would just be surface information and nothing below the surface, meaning the deeper spiritual meaning.  That is why the historical, grammatical and literal interpretation is so “wooden,” and, frankly, boring.  It is extremely boring to the elect children of God because we are listening for Christ’s voice, and we do not hear it when a preacher is preaching in that manner.  And I think it is probably boring even to the people of the world.  “Alright, if you are just going to tell me about historical events, please tell me something exciting about what is happening.”  They would fall asleep with that kind of account if the preacher was to preach sermon after sermon, after sermon, which he should do, given the fact that it is 67 verses.  And, yet, I am sure you would not find many preachers that would preach a series of sermons in Genesis 24 following their historical, grammatical and literal interpretation because they do not see any “substance” or material here.  But when you go into that deeper spiritual level, then what could be a boring tale becomes exciting.  It becomes full of rich information that God would have the reader to know and, of course, that is how it is with the whole Bible – there is the surface material and there is the deeper hidden truth and mysteries that must be discovered, as God directs His people in the way and opens up their understanding to it.

So, yes, we are going to cover this material again, but we will not spend as much time as we did the first time.  But before we get back to Genesis 24, let us go to 2Peter and read this for the benefit of us all.  It says in 2Peter 1:12-15:

Wherefore I will not be negligent to put you always in remembrance of these things, though ye know them, and be established in the present truth. Yea, I think it meet, as long as I am in this tabernacle, to stir you up by putting you in remembrance; Knowing that shortly I must put off this my tabernacle, even as our Lord Jesus Christ hath shewed me.  Moreover I will endeavour that ye may be able after my decease to have these things always in remembrance.

There is a spiritual meaning to “remembrance” that relates to the deeper spiritual meaning.  When the disciples heard Jesus talk about the leaven of the Pharisees, and they naturally thought of physical bread, Jesus immediately admonished them and He said, “Do ye not understand, neither remember?”  It had to do with “doctrine,” and He related it to the feeding of the multitude when they “broke the bread.”  So when we are brought into remembrance of the Scripture, one of the reasons God has for doing so is to help us, the reader of the Bible, to see the spiritual meaning.  And, of course, that would be the purpose back in Genesis 24, as it is repeated.  “Do ye not hear the Law?”  Genesis is part of the Pentateuch, called the Law, and to hear it would mean to hear it with spiritual ears and to hear the Gospel mystery.  So God is running it by our ears one more time.

Let us go back to Genesis 24, and we will read Genesis 24:37:

And my master made me swear, saying, Thou shalt not take a wife to my son of the daughters of the Canaanites, in whose land I dwell:

And, again, this was mentioned earlier in the chapter.  Abraham did make him swear.  He was to put his hand under his thigh and swear that he would not take a wife for his son of the daughters of the Canaanites.  And he swore, and this teaches us that there are not to be unequally-yoked relationships in the marriage between a man and a woman.  God’s elect people must do their very best to marry another elect person.  Of course, we can never perfectly know the heart of someone else, so it was always possible that someone could really try to ascertain the spiritual condition of their prospective spouse.  And when it comes to marriage, you had better try to do that.  Do not worry about judging.  You are judging a future marriage partner – you are not judging an individual.  You are judging whether that person is qualified to enter into a marriage in which there can be no divorce unto death, and that is what makes it such a serious thing.  So there should be a very careful analysis of the other person regarding the Word of God.  Of course, it is fine for two people to get together and talk about general things, like what is going on every day or what is going on at work, or even to joke a little bit and have fun.  But none of that helps either one to determine whether the other person is an elect child of God.  None of that will because there are very “nice, fine people” that are of the world and, yet, they have desperately wicked hearts of stone.  They are spiritually dead.

You know, this is what being unequally yoked comes down to – it is when a spiritually dead person is married to a spiritually living person.  Now I am sure that anyone considering marriage would not want to go to a cemetery to find a mate.  They would recognize that it is full of dead, stinking corpses: “What kind of relationship could I have with a dead, stinking corpse?  I am a living person.  And this person in the grave is dead.  I cannot talk with this person.  This person cannot hear me.”  We certainly would not have the same interests because that person has no interests at all, being dead. 

And that is exactly how it is in spiritual matters when a living child of God marries a spiritually dead person, even one that may profess to be a Christian.  Then when you come together to talk about spiritual things after marriage, you find out there is no understanding – no ears to hear, no eyes to see, and no willingness or ability to walk in God’s commandments as they are revealed by God to His people.  No – they do not understand; they do not want to do it.  They are contrary to it.  You would have nothing but a constant battle on your hands, on point, after point, after point, because God’s Word leads and directs the lives of His people on a daily and even minute-by-minute basis throughout the day.  We follow God’s Word, but an individual that is not truly saved will not follow God’s Word.  God is not in all their thoughts.  They do their own thing, so it is very important that we not be unequally yoked.   You can think about it as a donkey yoked to an ox, if you like, but it is probably best to think of yourself linked to a dead, stinking corpse as your marriage partner. 

The reason there have been unequally yoked marriages oftentimes over the history of the world is because the stinking dead corpse is “housed” in a beautiful whited sepulchre of their physical body.  And that physical body might be grand and beautiful or handsome, but very deceiving.  That is the nature of sin.  Sin is deceitful and man’s heart is deceitful in all things.

Jesus recognized this in the Pharisees.  They were “full of dead man’s bones” and, yet, they had “whited sepulchres” and their outward appearance may have been very nice.

So it is very important when entering into marriage to make a determination, which is a judgment: “Is this person qualified?  Are they truly one of God’s elect?”  Follow what God says and do not look on the outward appearance.  But, like God, to the best of your ability, look on the heart.  Look on the heart because that is really where the question is concerning salvation.  It is not in a nice smile or cute little dimple. 

It is what is going on in the heart, and the only way to find out the heart condition is to start talking about the Bible, the Word of God and its doctrines.  Do not just say, “Well, we agree that Christ died for sinners,” or look at just general and generic kinds of  Gospel beliefs.  “There is a God.”  That is wonderful.  “Christ died for sinners.”  We agree on that, but now get specific.   You could be on a date and it would be a very good subject matter on a dinner date.  “Do you believe that Jesus made payment for sin or at the foundation of the world?”  Then see what the answer is, and this is a very hard subject for someone with a natural mind to grasp, so probe a little bit and make sure they have some real understanding.  If they do say, “It was at the foundation of the world,” then you ask, “Do you know what that means?”  Then ask about hell: “Do you believe there is a place called Hell where people will suffer for ever and ever, or do you think hell is a condition?”  Then go to another subject: “What do you think about the church age?  Did you hear that Mr. Camping came out with a book, ‘The End of the Church Age and after,’ and what did you think about that?  That means God’s Spirit left the churches and His people were called and commanded to come out, and not to return.”  Then discuss it.  That would be a subject to spend a long time talking about, but maybe not so long a time if there is a lack of understanding on the part of the person or if the person is still a member of a church, as they should not be a member of a church or going to a church at all.  So if they do not understand that, then you can finish eating and stop talking because you have your answer. 

If the person does not understand the end of the church age, you are going to have nothing but trouble if you were to marry that person.  What do you think would happen every Sunday?  That person wants to go to church and you say, “No – the church age is over,” and there would constant bickering and a life full of trouble. 

What about Judgment Day?  Let us say the person understands the end of the church age, but then you ask, “Do you remember hearing about May 21, 2011, a few years ago and how that news was all over?  Do you think that really happened?  What do you think happened?  Is it possible a spiritual judgment happened?”  Get their reaction.  Then at some point you would say what you believe: “I think God did shut the door.  I think salvation has come to an end.”  Get their reaction.  Analyze these things.  Take it in, and then if the person seems to accept it all, then talk about children:  “You know, it pains me to even talk about it, but if God shut the door and stopped saving people because He has completed salvation, then what does that mean for children we might have?”  And talk about that. 

By the way, it is true that God wants us to continue to have children.  We are certainly not to stop that, but if we have children, we are to continue to raise them unto the hearing of the Word of God, the Bible, and we are to pray for our children with all our hearts that the cup of wrath might pass from them, and we pour out our hearts for them.  But we also have to understand that the door is shut.  It is not me or something that I want, of course.  I would want the opposite, but the door is shut, according to the Bible, and what God has shut, no man can open.  That is a supreme test.  See how that person responds.  And this is what God’s people have done in part, but maybe not thoroughly enough, but we have done this throughout history, and we should be doing it today.  These doctrines are tremendous testing grounds, so we can use them to gauge whether another person is qualified to enter into marriage, and we would be equally yoked as true elect children of God.

This is why thousands of years ago there was the same concern: “Thou shalt not take a wife to my son of the daughters of the Canaanites, in whose land I dwell.”  It was really instruction by Abraham, who is commonly identified as Father Abraham in the Bible because he points to God.  It is why he directed his servant not to take a bride from the Canaanites, but to take a bride from his father’s house, as it says in Genesis 24:38:

But thou shalt go unto my father's house, and to my kindred, and take a wife unto my son.

These were very specific directions – not of these, but of those.  And this has to do with God’s salvation program.  It is the prerequisite and what God established before He sent forth the Gospel into the world: “You are not to go to certain people, but you are to go to another certain people.”  We will look at verses that tell us that very directly, but we will have to do that when we get together in our next Bible study.