Looking For the Camels
Gen. 24
INTRO: Do you love a Love Story? “chick flicks” not the guy thing, But I still enjoy the love stories of the Bible
1. Jacob & Rachel, Ruth & Naomi Ruth & Boaz
2. David & Jonathon (brotherly love) friendship
3. Isaac & Rebekah
B. Story: Abrahm is aging, Sarah is dead, Isaac is unmarried
1. He calls his servant Eliezer makes him promise to return
to Mesopotamia to get a Bride for His Son Isaac
a. He gathers his camels & provisions for the long journey
to Mesopotamia
2. Comes to the well & prays fro God’s providence
C. Out comes Rebekah v15-19
1. She is Beautiful, Hottie, Gorgeous, Fox WOW!!!!!
2. Worker, modern, active, not lazy, dependable for family
a. Courageous to go to well alone.
3. Pure, 2 ways of saying the same thing, virgin & never
known by a man Significant
a. Her Purity, Holiness, Morals
b. Important to Holy Spirit who is inspiring this story
1. lifestyle God encourages & wants from His people
4. Later in v65 she veiled herself normal then of femininity
& humility
5. She is as good as they get. Gorgeous, smart/hard
worker, pure & humble a. Dream girl!
6. What about Isaac? What is He doing all this time?
I. Isaac WAITS
A. Days, weeks months go by
1. Long journey via walking & camels approx. 1500 miles
2. No airplanes, trains, buses or interstate to drive
3. Long for Eliezer to go & do the business of finding the
bride then that same journey back
a. All the time Isaac WAITS & WAITS
B. We are an impatient people any more
1. We have lost our sense of patients in life
2. We want every thing NOW, Instantaneously
a. Instant potatoes, popcorn, news internet
1. Cant wait for mail so we call or email & sometimes that isn’t
soon enough
b. Honk at the intersection if the car in front doesn’t
move the instant the light turns green
c. How many of you count the items of the person in front
of you in the Express lane at W-M 12 items or less
3. We can’t stand to wait
a. Once I am ready at home to go somewhere I don’t
want to wait on Julie & the kids
1. Every second more just builds the steam under my hood
4. Isaac is waiting
C. But God leads us to wait, brings us to a place to wait
1. Is there any here, that you are waiting?
a. You are waiting for God to open a door, to change
something or to fulfill a promise?
2. It is hard to wait isn’t it?
3. Yet that is exactly where God wants you, where you are
waiting for His schedule
4. Isaac is waiting but something else
III. Isaac Hurts,
A. Bad enough that he is waiting but to do it & hurt, it is
excruciating
1. No doubt Isaac waited in anticipation, excited to meet
his new bride & the future that meant
a. But he was also hurting Why do I say this?
B. Chap 23 we see Sarah Isaac’s mother has died
1. What a sad day that had to be for Isaac, when His mom
passed away
2. v63 went out to mediate, looking at the root of this Heb
word suwach = soo akh
a. Means to speak, to complain
b. But get to the picture it paint is to chew upon
c. Meditating, complain to God, to whoever would listen,
kept bring it up over & over
*Like a cow that keeps regurgitating to chew its’ cud
3. When Rebekah finally arrives v67 He was comforted
after his mother’s death
C. One thing to wait another to wait & hurt
1. To get impatient at W-M is trivial or impatient behind a
slow car in minor
2. To wait at the hospital, when things are not in your control
**Alice Sago had her stroke & lingered in ICU for days then discovering she was brain dead, To see somebody you cared for & love to go from strong & vibrant individual to laying in a bed with tubes & machines all around keeping the heart & lungs working.
** to keep watch over that loved one that cancer has ravaged
3. to hurt & wait is painful
4. Yet God sometimes leads to a place not only to wait but
also hurt & wait, Powerless
5. Some been there, some maybe there, some will be there
6. But is that the end? Thankfully NO!
III. Isaac’s Redemption, Relief
A. That journey back, what do you think the conversation is
like between Rebekah & Eliezer?
1. She is no doubt asking what is He like? what does he look
like? how tall is he, what color eyes, hair. voice likes & dislikes.
Is he gentle, kind, loving good
2. Get the idea that Eliezer: picture of the Holy Spirit?
a. Rebekah represents you & I the church
1. Old songs, More about Jesus would I know
Tell me the story of Jesus,
B. The day comes, She’s here
1. Isaac is in the field, what does he see first? v63
a. The camels
2. God’s Provisions, Providence
3. When he was hurting, waiting the camels finally came
4. We wait & we hurt & we wait & hurt & wait
a. God provides His comfort, His strength, His grace
b. The answer to our needs
5. While in the hospital waiting, God provided many good
people from this congregation to get us through
6. Throughout my ministry, when I’d be waiting needing
answer, God would send what ever it was I needed.
a. Sometimes it would be money to pay a bill,
b. Sometime it was friends to say the right word,
c. Sometimes it was somebody that could do what I
couldn’t do
7. But The camels came, God is faithful
