As we move through human history in Genesis, we come to God’s course-altering promise to Abraham in chapter 12. Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto a land that I will shew thee: And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing (Gen. 12:1-2).
What a grand way to start the chapter. But in the 18 verses that follow, we go from A) God’s amazing call and promise to Abraham to B) Abraham ending up in the promised land and building alters to God to (C) Abraham moving away from the promised land into Egypt because of a famine to D) Abraham assuming Pharoah will “want” his wife, and to spare his own skin, he makes a plan to allow Pharoah to peacefully take her from him. “So long, sweetie.”
How quickly he spirals into absurdity!
But my purpose here is not to drag Abraham through the mud. I want to point out a few things:
While Abraham was in charge of directing the affairs of their married life as the man of the household through whom God directs, Sarah was in charge of her responses. God doesn’t share her response or attitude here in Genesis. We like to imagine what our response would be. But we DO get her attitude in 1 Pet 3:1-6. She handled it like a champ, becoming one of our great role models.
But here’s the “rest of the story” from Gen. 12. It doesn’t end with Sarah becoming part of Pharoah’s haram. It ends with a “but God” moment. Read Gen. 12:17-20. God plagued Pharoah’s household because he took Sarah. Pharoah got to the bottom of it and discovered that Sarah was actually Abraham’s wife. The situation knocked some sense into Pharoah and he gave her back unharmed and sent them away after rebuking Abraham for allowing this situation to happen in the first place.
Here are the things I see from this chapter:
- No matter what the situation, God is in control. He can change bad circumstances around.
- When the husband makes seriously stupid choices, the wife’s correct response is to repeat these 2 verses: The LORD is on my side; I will not fear: what can man do unto me? It is better to trust in the LORD than to put confidence in man. (Ps. 118:6&8) And then, actually trust the Lord! It takes practice, but there’s victory to be had.
- God had a plan for Abraham and Sarah’s life. He already stated it earlier in the chapter. God will see to it that His plans and purposes are fulfilled. Nothing can stop it. Not even the forks in the road where we take the “wrong” turn.
- God can use unsaved people to help steer our lives into God’s paths. They don’t realize they are tools in God’s hands.
You probably already know all this, but look at it from a different perspective in the poem below.
Jody
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