And now, I'm so excited to be able to share this Biblical illustration with you. It begins in Genesis 22, where we see the father (Abraham) taking his son, Isaac, on a three-day journey where the father is to sacrifice his son on a particular mountain (same mountain ridge as Mt. Calvary!). God is testing Abraham.
And we see the son, Isaac, under the death sentence for three days as they walk to the hill, and then the father puts the wood of an altar on Isaac, and the son carries the wood, upon which he is meant to die, up a hill.
But mercifully and miraculously, God stops the offering right as Abraham is in mid-swing with the knife, and the father receives his son back "as from the dead" (Hebrews 11:19), on the third day!
This story is in the Bible to show us the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ. Here we can wash at the cross as we see Christ, who willingly carried His cross up Calvary's hill, there to die as our Scapegoat and our Sacrifice of atonement. Then on the third day, the Father received His Son back from the dead; having purchased our eternal inheritance, Jesus sat down at the Father's right hand.
But our topic today centers on what happened next in the life of Abraham and Isaac. And so, we read this in Genesis 24:
"Abraham was now very old, and the Lord had blessed him in every way. 2 He said to the senior servant in his household, the one in charge of all that he had, "Put your hand under my thigh. 3 I want you to swear by the Lord, the God of heaven and the God of earth, that you will not get a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, among whom I am living, 4 but will go to my country and my own relatives and get a wife for my son Isaac." Genesis 24:1-4 (NIV)
Here we see the father sending his unnamed servant to a distant country to get a bride for his son. And if we read the rest of the story, we see how God miraculously leads this servant straight to the woman that God had chosen to be Isaac’s wife - Rebekah!
But what’s really remarkable is how the servant woos Rebekah by speaking all about his master’s son. The message of the servant, as they all sit down to dinner, is about the son. The servant won’t even eat before he tells Rebekah all about his master’s son!
"Then food was set before him, but he said, “I will not eat until I have told you what I have to say.” “Then tell us,” Laban said. 34 So he said, “I am Abraham's servant. 35 The Lord has blessed my master abundantly, and he has become wealthy. He has given him sheep and cattle, silver and gold, male and female servants, and camels and donkeys. 36 My master's wife Sarah has borne him a son in her old age, and he has given him everything he owns." Genesis 24:33-36 (NIV)