Faith in the Waiting - Treasures of Faith - Week 5 Day 4

TODAY'S TREASURE

Isaac prayed to the Lord on behalf of his wife, because she was childless. The Lord answered his prayer, and his wife Rebekah became pregnant.

Genesis 25:21

Transcript

Faith in the Waiting

Chuck and Sharon Betters

Today’s Treasure

Isaac prayed to the Lord on behalf of his wife, because she was childless. The Lord answered his prayer, and his wife Rebekah became pregnant.

Genesis 25:21

Waiting on God can feel like silence, like standing still in a storm while the world rushes ahead. But in that quiet space, where nothing changes and hope starts to wear thin, faith has room to grow. Faith is not proved in answered prayer alone—but in the persistent, unseen moments of trust when no answer comes.

Isaac knew something about waiting. For twenty years, he and Rebekah were childless. Twenty years of hope deferred. Twenty years of wondering if God's promises would be fulfilled through them. Isaac was the “child of promise,” yet the next step of the promise—offspring—was slow in coming. Instead of rushing to create a solution, like his father Abraham had done, Isaac prayed. He waited. And eventually, God answered yes.

This marks a powerful spiritual moment in Isaac’s life. Unlike Abraham, who had tried to speed up God's timeline with Hagar, Isaac chose a better path. He laid his burden before the Lord. And God, in His time, opened Rebekah’s womb.

Faith in the waiting often feels like weakness. We cry out again and again with no response, and doubt whispers that maybe God has forgotten. But Isaac’s story teaches us that waiting can be an act of worship. Every prayer offered, every day we choose to trust, every time we surrender our timeline to God’s wisdom—it matters. We believe such waiting, even in the world of lament, is a sign of great faith, not weakness. Because we are turning to our Father who invites our questions and holds us tightly in His grip as we wait.

God answered Isaac’s prayer. Rebekah conceived, but the unusual amount of jostling in her womb troubled her. When she took her concerns to God, this frightened mother learned that she was not carrying one child but two: twin boys destined to become the fathers of two great nations (vv. 22–23). Perhaps even more startling was God’s revelation that the firstborn child would eventually serve the second (v. 23).

This was unsettling news to Rebekah. In their culture, birth order was of paramount importance. Leadership of the clan was always passed on to the oldest son, and this authority was conferred formally through the patriarchal blessing. Yet God had declared that Esau, the older twin, would serve the younger twin, Jacob. This divine choice was not based on Jacob’s inherent merit or value but on God’s sovereign purposes (Romans 9:11–13). By overruling the traditional rights of the firstborn and declaring His choice before the boys were even born, God was making it clear that He alone, not tradition or circumstance, was in absolute control of this family.

This unusual situation served to bring Isaac to a difficult crossroad. Although the Scriptures are silent as to whether Rebekah told Isaac about God’s plan for the twins, it is unlikely she kept this information from him. The twins’ birth only served to illustrate the unusual nature of their relationship to one another. Esau emerged from the womb, red and hairy, followed by Jacob, who was hanging onto his brother’s heel (Genesis 25:24-26).

The twins had markedly different personalities: Esau was a skillful hunter, a man of the woods and fields, whereas Jacob was more of a homebody. The Bible tells us that “Isaac, who had a taste for wild game, loved Esau, but Rebekah loved Jacob” (v. 28); this is the first hint that, although the marriage of Isaac and Rebekah started out with love, something had subtly changed. This was now a home troubled by the destructive sin of favoritism, and this favoritism for their children had begun to drive a wedge between them. Isaac, who loved good food, preferred Esau, who knew how to satisfy his father’s cravings. Esau, however, cared little about his role and responsibility as the firstborn son.

The brothers’ growing animosity toward one another was certainly evident the time Esau, famished from a day’s hunting, carelessly traded away the birthright he scorned to Jacob for a mere pot of stew (vv. 29–34). Esau also showed his disregard for his parents by marrying a Canaanite woman, someone who was probably not a believer in the Lord God and who was certainly a “source of grief” to his parents (Genesis 26:34-35). Isaac was constantly battling these same Canaanites over control of his wells and property rights. They were a people who, for the most part, had rejected both Isaac’s family and his God. Yet Esau proceeded to sadden his parents by marrying first one and then another of these unbelieving women.

LIFE-GIVING ENCOURAGEMENT

Isaac’s heart, not unlike his home, was divided. He attempted to serve two masters. On the one hand, his cultural context demanded that Esau receive the patriarchal blessing and inheritance. On the other hand, God could not have been clearer: the blessing was to go to Jacob. Esau was a son out of control, displeasing to God, and an embarrassment to the moral and spiritual values of his family and their God. Blinded by his pride in Esau’s toughness and hunting abilities, Isaac was unaware that he and his family were headed for a time of great sadness and a crisis that would sorely test them all.

Friends, do you see the warning from our Father in this story? Isaac and Rebekah started out fully committed to serving God, trusting Him to give them the son of promise in His timing. He gave them double their expectations – twins! But Isaac and Rebekah slowly allowed conflict into their marriage. And we can conclude this conflict was rooted in less dependence on the Lord, a dependence we have seen reflected in the previous twenty years of the waiting room. Perhaps you, too, need this wake up call? Is your passion for Jesus waning?  Have the very gifts God has given to you, turned your heart toward the gift rather than the Giver? Let’s allow Isaac and Rebekah’s story to shine a light on any idols in our hearts that demand worship stolen from our Father in Heaven.

PRAYER

Father, like frogs in a kettle, we often grow lukewarm in our faith, creating fertile ground for the enemy to drive a wedge between us and You. May Isaac and Rebekah’s story open our eyes to idols disguised as “good,” yet are cooling our passion for You as we worship them.

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Adapted from Treasures of Faith by Chuck and Sharon Betters with permission from P&R Publishing

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