Genesis 24 – Study

For those who may wish to ‘study’ this chapter, the following simple resources are provided for you. Each passage has a four-Part approach to help you take in and think further about what you have read.

Passage: Genesis 24:1-9

1 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.’

5 The servant asked him, ‘What if the woman is unwilling to come back with me to this land? Shall I then take your son back to the country you came from?’

6 ‘Make sure that you do not take my son back there,’ Abraham said. 7 ‘The Lord, the God of heaven, who brought me out of my father’s household and my native land and who spoke to me and promised me on oath, saying, “To your offspring I will give this land”– he will send his angel before you so that you can get a wife for my son from there. 8 If the woman is unwilling to come back with you, then you will be released from this oath of mine. Only do not take my son back there.’ 9 So the servant put his hand under the thigh of his master Abraham and swore an oath to him concerning this matter.

A. Find Out:

1. What was Abraham’s servant NOT to do? v.3
2. What WAS he to do? v.4
3. What was the servant’s worry? v.6
4. What did Abraham say he MUSTN’T do? v.7
5. What did he say the Lord would do? v.7
6. What was Abraham’s concern again expressed? v.8b

B. Think:

1. What was Abraham basically trying to achieve?
2. What were the two conditions that he gave to his servant?
3. What do you think this passage tells us about Abraham?

C. Comment:

First, consider Abraham’s aim. He is getting near the end of his life and Isaac has not yet got a wife. The Lord had promised blessing for future generations and so Abraham wants to make sure Isaac’s future is established and so to do this he is going to have to arrange for a wife for Isaac.

Second, note the conditions he knows will have to apply. The wife must not come from the idol worshipping Canaanites all around him. This means Abraham will have to send back to his old home and so he sends his trusted chief servant. The servant raises a potential problem: perhaps the woman will not come. What then? Well, whatever else happens Isaac is not to go back there. HERE is the land of God’s choosing. In all this we see Abraham resting in the knowledge that God will go ahead of his servant and prepare the way.

In his old age we see an Abraham who now trusts in God’s promises and bases his whole life on those promises. There is a beautiful combination here of TRUSTING God’s word, and WORKING to achieve that word. Abraham will shortly die (see Genesis 25:7,8) but the last we see of him is him co-operating with the Lord in seeking to achieve the Lord’s stated ongoing purposes for him. How wonderful!

D. Application?

1. Do we base our whole lives on the promises God has made US?
2. Purpose before God today what you WILL do that!

Additional Passage: Hebrews 11:8-12, 17-19

– picking up on Abraham in the New Testament

8 By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going. 9 By faith he made his home in the promised land like a stranger in a foreign country; he lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. 10 For he was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God. 11 And by faith even Sarah, who was past childbearing age, was enabled to bear children because she considered him faithful who had made the promise. 12 And so from this one man, and he as good as dead, came descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as countless as the sand on the seashore.

17 By faith Abraham, when God tested him, offered Isaac as a sacrifice. He who had embraced the promises was about to sacrifice his one and only son, 18 even though God had said to him, ‘It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned.’19 Abraham reasoned that God could even raise the dead, and so in a manner of speaking he did receive Isaac back from death.

A. Find Out:

In this final study on Abraham, we see how he is commended in the New Testament for his faith.

1. What are the 4 things he is commended for? v.8 v.9 v.11 v.17
2. What did he believe God would build? v.10
3. What characteristic of God did Abraham rely upon? v.11
4. What did Abraham’s faith enable God to do? v.11
5. What did he also consider God could do? v.19
6. And therefore what happened? v.19

B. Think:

1. How would you summarize why Abraham was commended?
2. When you consider that Abraham didn’t have the Bible or hardly any revelation about God, what does it say about him?
3. How does our faith enable God to move?

C. Comment:

The writer to the Hebrews commends Abraham for his faith which was shown by:

1. Leaving his home at God’s command
2. Making his home in Canaan at God’s command
3. Trying to have children in old age at God’s promise
4. Be willing to sacrifice Isaac at God’s command

In each case Abraham responded to God’s word. That is what faith is: responding to what God has said. Faith is important because it is our actions which enables God to then work through us. Faith is first BELIEVING what God says then DOING what He says. Look up James 2:21 ,22 and see how faith is both believing and doing.

So we have observed in this man Abraham, his frailty, weaknesses and failures but also that he was commended for these four actions of his that revealed him truly as a man of faith.

D. Application:

1. Ask the Lord to teach you to hear Him more clearly.
2. Ask Him to lead you to become a man or woman of faith.
3. Thank Him that He is faithful and will always do what He has said.