The Bible Recap - Day 020 (Genesis 25-26) - Year 7

Episode Date: January 20, 2025

FROM TODAY’S RECAP: - Acts 17:11 - Romans 8 - Psalm 116 - Hosea 11 - Have your CHURCH partner with The Bible Recap! Note: We provide links to specific resources; this is not an endorsement of the entire website, author, organization, etc. Their views may not represent our own. SHOW NOTES: - Follow The Bible Recap: Instagram | Facebook | TikTok | YouTube - Follow Tara-Leigh Cobble: Instagram - Read/listen on the Bible App or Dwell App - Learn more at our Start Page - Become a RECAPtain - Shop the TBR Store - Credits PARTNER MINISTRIES: D-Group International Israelux The God Shot TLC Writing & Speaking DISCLAIMER: The Bible Recap, Tara-Leigh Cobble, and affiliates are not a church, pastor, spiritual authority, or counseling service. Listeners and viewers consume this content on a voluntary basis and assume all responsibility for the resulting consequences and impact.

Hey Bible readers, I'm Tara Lee Cobble and I'm your host for the Bible Recap. I want to start today with a bit of encouragement. I love seeing that you're all looking to Scripture for truth. In Acts 17 11, Luke praises the Bereans who did this. He says, Now the Berean Jews were of more noble character than those in Thessalonica, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true. Please do that with everything I say here, because first of all, there may be times when

I'm just plain wrong about something. I go to great lengths to avoid that, but it's bound to happen at some point. And then at other times, I may not communicate something in the clearest way possible and it may end up being confused. So forgive me for any missteps I make in communication and know that I make every effort to speak truth with clarity. And keep searching the scriptures because I am not the final word on anything. Okay, today in our reading we open with Abraham remarrying after Sarah's death.

His second wife is named Keturah and even though he's super old, he has six more kids, which brings us to a grand total of eight. But all his inheritance goes to Isaac as God told him because Isaac is the child through which God would establish his promise to Abraham. He's also the only child of Abraham's first wife, Sarah. Abraham dies at 175 years old. His son with Hagar, Ishmael, died a few decades later, when he was 137. We encounter a few lines of genealogies here, but resist the urge to skip past those.

Let your eyes fall on every word. a few lines of genealogies here, but resist the urge to skip past those. Let your eyes fall on every word. You won't remember it all, but once you see something several times, it starts to stick with you little by little. And here's one of my favorite pro tips. If you get bogged down trying to pronounce all the names in genealogies as you read them,

maybe try having an audio Bible app read them to you. After the genealogies, we get bits and pieces of a few storylines throughout the rest of our reading. I'm gonna follow the Isaac storyline first, then I'll jump back to the part about his kids. So I'm not necessarily always going to recap in the exact order we're reading it, I'm just summarizing. In chapter 26, God appears to Isaac like he did to Abraham.

And then right after God's promise to him, Isaac starts lying. He manifests the same sins of his father Abraham calling his wife his sister, but this time it wasn't even half true. And some commentators say this could have also been the same King Abimelek that Abraham dealt with about the very same thing. In both of these stories, we see that King Abimelek actually has a higher view of God's holiness than Abraham and Isaac seemed to.

In response to Isaac's sin, God protects him and blesses him, and quickly. Within a year, Isaac sows and reaps 100-fold. Because of his success, King Abimelek tries to get rid of him, which is one thing we'll see a lot of. Anytime this family that God has established a relationship with starts to flourish, the people around them notice.

They become jealous of them or afraid of them. They want them dead and gone. This is a theme with Abraham's descendants, but God preserves them. Next, God appears to Isaac again at the very first well his father Abraham had taken possession of back in chapter 21, Beersheba, and God promises again to bless and multiply him. The promise that was originally for Isaac's father Abraham must extend through Isaac because he is the child of the promise, the only child of Abraham and Sarah. As we learned yesterday, Isaac got married at age 40, and today we see that he and Rebecca have their first child when he is 60.

This actually happens 15 years before Abraham dies, but sometimes Genesis likes to give these weird flash-forward moments, so just bear with it. Anyway, Rebekah is barren for 20 years, but Isaac knows the God who grants life. He's evidence of it. So he intercedes on behalf of Rebekah, and God answers his prayers with a yes. Sometimes, God answers with a no. But all of God's answers to our prayers, whether yes or no or wait, serve to establish His very good plans. In this instance, in order for God to fulfill His promise of many offspring to Abraham and Isaac, God would have to open Rebekah's womb.

And when He does, Rebekah becomes pregnant with twins. I wonder if these are the very first twins ever. Rebecca has a lot of questions about what's happening and I love that she takes her questions to God and he answers her. God's answer is kind of perplexing though because he basically tells her that his plan for these two children would go against the cultural norms of their day. The older son will not take prominence. Instead, the younger son will rule. This would be kind of like if the crown passed straight from King Charles to Prince Harry, skipping over all

of Prince William and his kids. Then, through a whole tangled mess of sin, God accomplishes his purposes to that end. We see part of that unfolding today, and we'll see the rest tomorrow. The part we see today is where Esau's impatience and Jacob's scheming add up to a transferred birthright, which is a thing bestowed on the firstborn signaling inheritance and prominence. Using a bowl of stew, God kind of flipped the script here. I relate to Esau a lot here. If you want to see me sin, wait for me to get tired and hungry. Give me a string of nights where I've only had a couple hours of sleep each night and

all my wisdom goes out the window. I would be wise to remember Esau's life. Also, this promise for the younger child? I want to point out that this isn't just a one-off situation as far as God is concerned. This has actually started to be a bit of a theme in Scripture as well. Let me point out a few other times this has happened so far. The offering of Abel, the younger child, was accepted while Cain, the firstborn, was not. Isaac, Abraham's second son, got the promises that normally would have gone to Ishmael. And then it happens again here with Jacob and Esau. Here's my take on what this is showing us.

There are a few places in Scripture that establish Jesus as our older brother. Romans 8 says He is the firstborn among many brothers. And if He's the firstborn, and we're the younger brothers and sisters, then He should get all the inheritance. But guess what? He shares. We know this because Romans 8 also tells us that we share in his inheritance. This reminds me of what we saw in Job where the daughters shared in the inheritance too.

We wrap up today's reading with a little section on Esau. Like his dad Isaac, he marries at 40. Sometimes when people talk about sexual purity, they say it's an outdated idea because the Bible was written when people got married so young at like 13 or 14. And maybe some of them did, but according to the few marriage ages we do have recorded, that's not necessarily always the case. There's one thing I want to make sure we don't miss in this final short paragraph. Esau marries two Hittite women. Not only does he marry two women, which is descriptive, not prescriptive,

meaning it's telling us what he did, not telling us what we should do, but in addition to that, both of these women are outside the family God has set His blessing on. His brother Jacob is committed to God's plan for this family, but Esau is indifferent or possibly even antagonistic to it. Rest assured though, even his rebellion fits into the big picture. What was your God shot for today? I loved seeing how God is no respecter of persons. for today. I loved seeing how God is no respecter of persons. He shows attention and favor to those who are not in the position of honor, the sojourners in the land and the latter born kids. Granted, I am the youngest child in my family, so maybe that's why it caught my attention, but I've seen this

aspect of God's character extend far beyond birth order. For instance, my homeless friends know things about God I couldn't possibly understand. They're more content in Him than I'll probably ever be. And I have a friend whose child has debilitating mental and physical issues, and sometimes he'll just be alone in a room and start laughing or smiling. And even though science would deem his brain inferior to mine, I think he knows things about God that I don't have the capacity to understand. The God who made the human brain is certainly not limited

to the number of its functions that we're currently aware of. I think there's a special way God communicates to those who are in situations that seem less desirable or more impossible. God is endeared to the needy, the lowly, and that's all of us, really. Psalm 116 tells us He bends down to listen. And Hosea 11 tells us that He bends down to feed us.

The more I can be aware of my neediness of Him, the more I'll delight in His nearness and provision, and the more my heart will remember that He is where the joy is. We love the local church. Every year, churches around the world recap together and they tell us how much more likely their people are to not only finish the Bible together, but to get more involved in church as well.

If your church, ministry, or small group is doing the Bible Recap together, check out thebiblerecap.com forward slash church. We have great tips for reading the Bible in community, we have study resources, and we even have finisher certificates to help you celebrate. And we would love to connect with you. So if your church is doing TBR, be sure to check out thebiblerecap.com forward slash church, or click the link in the show notes.