He said, “For now the LORD has made room for us, and we will be fruitful in the land.”Gen 26:22
God said to Abraham: “No, but Sarah, your wife, will bear you a son. You shall call his name Isaac. I will establish my covenant with him for an everlasting covenant for his offspring after him” (Gen 17:19). “Sarah conceived, and bore Abraham a son in his old age, at the set time of which God had spoken to him” (Gen 21:2). “Abraham was one hundred years old when his son, Isaac, was born to him” (Gen 21:5). Sarah said, “God has made me laugh. Everyone who hears will laugh with me” (Gen 21:6). “Abraham made a great feast on the day that Isaac was weaned” (Gen 21:8). God said to Abraham: “your offspring will be named through Isaac” (Gen 21:12). For Isaac’s birth, his weaning, and the sending away of Hagar and her son, see Abraham, Lesson 6.
“After these things, God tested Abraham” (Gen 22:1), and said: “Now take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love, and go into the land of Moriah” (Gen 22:2). Abraham “took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac his son” (Gen 22:6). Isaac asked: “Here is the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?” (Gen 22:7). Abraham “bound Isaac his son, and laid him on the altar, on the wood” (Gen 22:9); the angel said, “Don’t lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him” (Gen 22:12). Abraham took a ram “and offered him up for a burnt offering instead of his son” (Gen 22:13). For the whole story, see Abraham, Lesson 7.
Later, “Sarah lived one hundred twenty-seven years” (Gen 23:1); “Sarah died in Kiriath Arba (also called Hebron), in the land of Canaan. Abraham came to mourn for Sarah, and to weep for her” (Gen 23:2).
Abraham sent his oldest servant back to his own country and relatives, to “take a wife for my son Isaac” (Gen 24:4). The servant prayed by the well outside the city of Nahor (Gen 24:10-14), and Rebekah came out with her pitcher, gave him water, and drew water for his camels too (Gen 24:15-20). Her family said: “The thing proceeds from the LORD” (Gen 24:50). When they asked Rebekah, “She said, ‘I will go’” (Gen 24:58).
“Isaac went out to meditate in the field at the evening. He lifted up his eyes and looked. Behold, there were camels coming” (Gen 24:63). “Isaac brought her into his mother Sarah’s tent, and took Rebekah, and she became his wife. He loved her. So Isaac was comforted after his mother’s death” (Gen 24:67). “Isaac was forty years old when he took Rebekah … to be his wife” (Gen 25:20).
“Abraham gave up his spirit, and died at a good old age, an old man, and full of years, and was gathered to his people” (Gen 25:8). “Isaac and Ishmael, his sons, buried him in the cave of Machpelah” (Gen 25:9). “After the death of Abraham, God blessed Isaac, his son” (Gen 25:11).
“Isaac entreated the LORD for his wife, because she was barren. The LORD was entreated by him, and Rebekah his wife conceived” (Gen 25:21). The children struggled within her, and “She went to inquire of the LORD” (Gen 25:22). The LORD said to her: “Two nations are in your womb. Two peoples will be separated from your body. The one people will be stronger than the other people. The elder will serve the younger” (Gen 25:23). She bore twins, Esau and Jacob (Gen 25:24-26). “Isaac was sixty years old when she bore them” (Gen 25:26).
“Now Isaac loved Esau, because he ate his venison. Rebekah loved Jacob” (Gen 25:28). One day Esau came in from the field famished, and traded his birthright for Jacob’s bread and lentil stew (Gen 25:29-34). “So Esau despised his birthright” (Gen 25:34).
There was another famine in the land, and “Isaac went to Abimelech king of the Philistines, to Gerar” (Gen 26:1). “The LORD appeared to him, and said, ‘Don’t go down into Egypt’” (Gen 26:2), “I will be with you, and will bless you” (Gen 26:3), and “I will establish the oath which I swore to Abraham your father” (Gen 26:3).
When the men of the place asked him about his wife, “He said, ‘She is my sister,’ for he was afraid to say, ‘My wife’” (Gen 26:7). Abimelech saw Isaac caressing Rebekah from a window and confronted him (Gen 26:8-10). Abraham had said the same thing (Gen 12:13; 20:2). “Isaac sowed in that land, and reaped in the same year one hundred times what he planted. The LORD blessed him” (Gen 26:12). “The Philistines envied him” (Gen 26:14), and Abimelech said to him, “Go away from us” (Gen 26:16).
Isaac dug again the wells his father had dug, and “He called their names after the names by which his father had called them” (Gen 26:18). His servants dug two wells, and both were taken by the herdsmen of Gerar; he named them Esek and Sitnah (Gen 26:20-21). He dug another, and “They didn’t argue over that one”; he said, “For now the LORD has made room for us, and we will be fruitful in the land” (Gen 26:22).
He went up to Beersheba, and “The LORD appeared to him the same night, and said, ‘I am the God of Abraham your father. Don’t be afraid, for I am with you’” (Gen 26:24). “He built an altar there, and called on the LORD’s name” (Gen 26:25). Abimelech came to see him and said, “We saw plainly that the LORD was with you” (Gen 26:28). “He made them a feast” (Gen 26:30), and they swore an oath to one another (Gen 26:31).
“When Esau was forty years old, he took as wife Judith, the daughter of Beeri the Hittite, and Basemath, the daughter of Elon the Hittite” (Gen 26:34); “They grieved Isaac’s and Rebekah’s spirits” (Gen 26:35).
“When Isaac was old, and his eyes were dim, so that he could not see” (Gen 27:1), he asked Esau to hunt and make him savory food, so that he could bless him before he died (Gen 27:2-4). Rebekah overheard, and had Jacob put on Esau’s clothes and go in as Esau to receive the blessing (Gen 27:5-17). Jacob said, “I am Esau your firstborn” (Gen 27:19), and Isaac blessed him (Gen 27:23-29). When Esau came back, “Isaac trembled violently” (Gen 27:33); Esau “cried with an exceedingly great and bitter cry, and said to his father, ‘Bless me, even me also, my father’” (Gen 27:34).
“Esau hated Jacob because of the blessing with which his father blessed him” (Gen 27:41). Rebekah told Jacob, “Arise, flee to Laban, my brother, in Haran” (Gen 27:43). “Isaac called Jacob, blessed him, and commanded him” (Gen 28:1), saying, “May God Almighty bless you, and make you fruitful, and multiply you, that you may be a company of peoples” (Gen 28:3), “and give you the blessing of Abraham, to you and to your offspring with you” (Gen 28:4). “Isaac sent Jacob away” (Gen 28:5).
Many years later, “Jacob came to Isaac his father, to Mamre, to Kiriath Arba (which is Hebron), where Abraham and Isaac lived as foreigners” (Gen 35:27). “The days of Isaac were one hundred eighty years” (Gen 35:28). “Isaac gave up the spirit and died, and was gathered to his people, old and full of days. Esau and Jacob, his sons, buried him” (Gen 35:29).
Matthew’s Gospel records the genealogy of Jesus Christ: “Abraham became the father of Isaac. Isaac became the father of Jacob” (Matt 1:2).
Jesus said: “many will come from the east and the west, and will sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matt 8:11). He also quoted God’s words, “I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob,” and said, “God is not the God of the dead, but of the living” (Matt 22:32).
Paul wrote: “your offspring will be accounted as from Isaac” (Rom 9:7); “Rebekah also conceived by one, by our father Isaac” (Rom 9:10); “it was said to her, ‘The elder will serve the younger’” (Rom 9:12). He also wrote: “Now we, brothers, as Isaac was, are children of promise” (Gal 4:28).
Hebrews says that Abraham “lived as an alien in the land of promise, as in a land not his own, dwelling in tents with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise” (Heb 11:9); “By faith, Abraham, being tested, offered up Isaac” (Heb 11:17); “By faith Isaac blessed Jacob and Esau, even concerning things to come” (Heb 11:20). And of Esau it says: “who sold his birthright for one meal” (Heb 12:16).
James writes that Abraham “offered up Isaac his son on the altar” (Jas 2:21).
Genesis It begins at the beginning; Isaac’s story is told mainly in chapters 21 – 28, and his death in chapter 35.
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Scripture: World English Bible.