GOD ESTABLISHES ISAAC'S FAMILY
Lesson 11
Genesis 23:1-24:67
Key Verse: 24:58
 
 

* THE DEATH OF SARAH (23:1-20)

1. Read chapter 23. What can you learn here about Abraham's life in the promised land? (Acts 7:5) How were the realities different from the promises he believed? What can you learn from his faith?

* A WIFE FOR ISAAC (24)

2. As this chapter opens, what is the situation of Abraham and his family? What problem is on his mind? What mission did Abraham give his chief servant? What shows that this was an important mission? (1-4)

3. Why do you think Abraham didn't want Isaac to marry a Canaanite? Why did he want the servant to find a wife for Isaac among his relatives?

4. What problem in carrying out his mission did the servant immediately foresee? What compromise did Abraham forbid him to make? Why? What did Abraham promise his servant that would make his mission possible? How did the servant indicate his acceptance of the mission? (5-9)

5. What preparations did he make? When he arrived in the town of Nahor, where did he go to begin looking, and what did he do first? What can we learn from him? (10-12a)

6. Look at his first prayer. (12?14) How did he address God? What was the specific condition he set in his prayer? What does this tell us about the kind of woman he was seeking for Isaac?

7. When the beautiful girl to whom he spoke acted according to the conditions of his prayer, what did the servant do? (15-21) How did he make sure that this was the girl God had chosen? What did he do as soon as he realized that God had led him to the right girl? (22-27) What can we learn from him?

8. How did he respond to the gracious hospitality which Rebekah's family extended to him? What was his main point in the long account he gave them of how he had met Rebekah? Why does he include so many details? (28-49) What was his conclusion? (48,49)

9. How did Rebekah's father and brother respond? (50,51) What did the servant do? (52-54) Why did he not stay a few days and enjoy a well?deserved vacation? When did he consider his mission completed? What can we learn from him about how to carry out God's mission?

* REBEKAH

10. What kind of girl was Rebekah? What was her decision? On what basis could she make such a decision? How was her faith like Abraham's? What broader meaning did Rebekah's family see in this marriage? (60)