Perhaps you remember Abraham's servant, the one he sent to Haran to find Isaac a wife.  First, let's realize that though we might automatically assume this is the Eleazar of Genesis 15, it is now so many years later that Eleazar would have been about 100.  Sending him on a trip hundreds of miles long that would possibly take over a month, might not have been realistic.  The Hebrew term we translate "oldest [servant] in his house who ruled over all he had," might be better translated, "Senior Administrator" (Gen 24:1)  I am certain that Abraham gave his elderly servants who had spent their lives serving him a retirement of sorts, lowering the task difficulty and the number of hours of real labor accordingly.  So we really do not know who this servant is. 
            However, whoever he is, he has learned about God from his master.  So when he arrives in Haran he asks God to be with him and give him this sign:  that the maiden who not only offers him a drink but also offers to water his camels, is the one he is meant to find (24:12-14).  And almost immediately it seems, Rebekah arrives on the scene.  She performs exactly as the servant had prayed. 
            Let's talk a minute about that task.  It was not uncommon for women and even older children to be charged with retrieving the water for the household.  I am sure we have all seen those jars they carry on their heads.  I am not sure how much those jars weighed, but I am told that a gallon of water weighs 8.33 pounds.  If the jar held five gallons, or the ancient equivalent, it would have weighed 41.67 pounds plus the weight of the jar.  That's quite a load.
            Now let's consider the camels.  The servant did not have just a couple of camels—he had ten (24:10).   I am told that a thirsty camel will drink 25 gallons of water.  Multiply that by 10 and then divide by the number of gallons in the jar, of which we are uncertain, but the more it held the better as far as having to draw up the water.  If it held 5 gallons, Rebekah would have had to draw water up from the well 50 times.  If the jar were smaller, we could be approaching 100.
            Rebekah was a teenager, probably 14-15.  Girls in ancient times were considered marriageable as soon as they reached puberty.  Some want to say that they reached puberty far later than our girls do today because they were not well-nourished.  Seems to me we are not talking about peasants here, but wealthy, or at least comfortable, families.  No malnourishment to worry about.  John MacArthur says that by the first century most all girls reached puberty by 13 based on social and marriage customs of the time.  Another thing we need to come to grips with as we study Genesis:  teenage girls sometimes married 40 year old men, or sometimes even older.
            Rebekah, and all teenagers in the Bible for that matter, did hard and heavy jobs that benefited the running of the entire family.  That doesn't mean their parents were abusers.  The children were raised to be responsible enough and strong enough to do it.  What about our children?  Are they raised thinking that they should be waited on hand and foot?  Do they have any idea what it takes to make a household run?  Do we tell them how important what they do is for us?  Have they ever come in tired and worn out because of actual work they have done?  No wonder employers nowadays have such a difficult time finding people who know how to work and have the will to do it.  A friend of mine actually told her children, "If you don't get the day's chores done, you don't get supper," based on 2 Thes 3:10.  Evidently, it worked, but only because she actually carried it out.
            Teaching your children to work, and to work hard, is a life skill they simply must have in order to be successful, both in this life and our spiritual lives.  We are not being good parents when we shirk that duty.
 
The one who is lazy becomes poor, but the one who works diligently becomes wealthy. The one who gathers crops in the summer is a wise son, but the one who sleeps during harvest is a shameful son Prov 10:4,5.
 
Dene Ward
 

Up in North Florida, we heated with wood.  A thirty-six-year-old Ashley wood stove sat in the heart of our home—the kitchen and family room area.  Our boys grew up watching their father labor with a chainsaw, axe, and splitting maul, eventually helping him load the eighteen inch lengths of wood into the pickup bed and then onto the wood racks.  Every time a friend or neighbor lost a tree or several large limbs fell, the phone rang, and the three of them set off for a Saturday’s worth of work that kept us warm for a few days and the heating bill down where we could pay it.
            At first those small boys could only carry one log at a time, and a small one at that.  Wood is heavy if still unseasoned, and always rough and unwieldy.  By the time they were 10, an armful numbered two or three standard logs, even the lighter, seasoned ones.  They were 16 or older before they could come close to their father’s armload of over half a dozen logs, and grown men before they could match him log for log.  Even that is a small amount of wood.  In a damped woodstove, it might last half the night, but on an open fire barely an hour.
            So I laugh when I see pictures of an 8-10 year old Isaac carrying four or five “sticks” up Mt Moriah behind his father Abraham.  To carry the amount of wood necessary to burn a very wet animal sacrifice, Isaac had to have been grown, or nearly so, not less than 16 or 17, and probably older and more filled out.  In fact, in the very next chapter, Genesis 23, Isaac is 37 years old.  In chapter 21, his weaning, he is somewhere between 3 and 8, so all we can say for certain is he is between 3 and 37 at the time of his offering.  Our experience with wood carrying tells me that he was far older than most people envision.
            Do you realize what that means?  This may well have been a test of Abraham’s faith, but it also shows that Isaac’s faith was not far behind his father’s.  He could easily have over-powered his father, a man probably two decades north of 100, and gotten away.  He, too, trusted that God would provide, even as he lay himself down on that altar and watched his father raise his hand.
            How did he know?  Because he watched God provide everyday of his life.  He saw his father’s relationship with God, heard his prayers and watched his offerings, witnessed the decisions he made every day based solely on his belief in God’s promises, and his absolute obedience even when it hurt, like sending his brother Ishmael away (Gen 21:12-14). Isaac did not know a time when his family did not trust God, so he did too.  “God will provide” made perfect sense to him.
            When that young man carried that hefty load of wood up that mountain, he went with a purpose, based upon the example of his father’s faith and his Father’s faithfulness.  Would your children be willing to carry that wood?
 
The living, the living, he thanks you, as I do this day; the father makes known to the children your faithfulness. Isaiah 38:19
 
Dene Ward

     How many times have I heard people read about Abraham and Sarah's subterfuge, "She is my sister," and then say something like, "How could 'the Friend of God,' 'the Father of the Faithful' do such a thing?  Where is all that faith he is so renowned for?
     The problem is, we judge them by what they eventually became, forgetting that they did not start there, any more than we started where we now are in our journey of faith.  We don't allow them to grow.  The Abraham and Sarah in Genesis 12 were not the Abraham and Sarah in Genesis 22.  So where did Abraham and Sarah really come from?
     Ur, of course, but what was that?  Ur was a city-state in an alliance of other Sumerian city-states.  We have already seen that it was a thriving metropolis.  Besides that, it was thoroughly pagan.  Every city in the alliance had a ziggarut at its center, devoted to the pagan god it worshipped.  (All of this comes from the Holman Bible Atlas.)  Abraham grew up not only in a pagan culture, but also in a pagan family.
     And Joshua said to all the people, “Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel, ‘Long ago, your fathers lived beyond the Euphrates, Terah, the father of Abraham and of Nahor; and they served other gods (Josh 24:2).  The real wonder is that Abraham and Sarah came to have any faith in God at all.  Yet they did, which is a clear vindication of Paul's statement in Romans 1 that the pagans were "without excuse" in their failure to recognize God (Rom 1:18-22).  Somehow that couple believed and God got them out of that culture where He could carefully cultivate their faith over the last half of their lives.
     And so here is the lesson: in our society it has become the rule to blame our culture, our parents, our community, whatever else we can blame for our failure to live righteous, godly lives, or at least a law-abiding, productive life that recognizes a standard of goodness toward others.  Even people in the government are ready to excuse criminals "because they don't know better."  If they do not know better, it is their own fault.  At least that is what God says about it.  Anyone in any culture can pull themselves out of it and do right.  In fact, it you were to find people who did that and ask them about it, they would be the ones who most staunchly deny that how you are raised is an excuse that counts for anything at all.  Is it difficult to get yourself out of the mess you find yourself in?  Of course it is, but life is never easy.  When we teach our children that it should be, we are setting them up for failure every time.
     Even the people who came out of Ur with Abraham and Sarah never really lost their cultural baggage.  Laban had gone to shear his sheep, and Rachel stole her father's household gods (Gen 31:19).  But Joshua told their descendants, as they came to the Promised Land, that the choice was theirs—they were not bound by their raising.  And if it is evil in your eyes to serve the LORD, choose this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your fathers served in the region beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD (Josh 24:15).
     We always have a choice.  No one can take it away from us.  It may be difficult, but that has never constituted a valid excuse to God.  He wants us to serve Him.  He may have given Abraham and Sarah a little boost by removing them from their culture, but why can't we do exactly the same thing?  We can, if we truly want to.  No one is ever forcing us to do otherwise.

I have Your decrees as a heritage forever; indeed, they are the joy of my heart. I am resolved to obey Your statutes to the very end (Ps 119:111-112).

Dene Ward

I’ve seen it all my life, everywhere I’ve ever been—a brand of false teaching that even the best of us participate in, that even the best of us fall prey to.
            Over and over we teach people to follow the examples of Herod and Herodias, of Ahab and Jezebel, of practically every evil king ever mentioned in the Bible.  We teach that example and we follow it ourselves.  The examples of Simon and David are left ignored, at least in that one area.  What am I talking about?  How to accept correction, how to appreciate the one who loves us enough to rebuke us or try to teach us better. 
            What did Simon the sorcerer say when Peter rebuked him? “Pray for me that none of the things that you have spoken may come upon me.”  Simon was only interested in being right before God, not in saving face or somehow turning the rebuke back on Peter because he was so angry or hurt by it.
            What did David say when Nathan stung him with the simple words “Thou art the man,” and followed it with a horrifying list of punishments, including the death of a child?  “I have sinned against the Lord.” And what did he do later?  He named a son after Nathan (1 Chron 3:5).  Every time he saw that child for the rest of his life, he was reminded of his namesake, the man who rebuked him and prophesied such devastating punishment.  All you have to do is read his penitent psalms to understand David’s attitude.  He was grateful to Nathan, not angry; heartbroken over his sin and joyful that God would even consider forgiving him.
            Simon and David set the bar high for us, a brand new Gentile convert and a king who could have lopped off his accuser’s head at a word. Yet how often are we counseled to follow their examples?  Instead, we are coddled by people who blame the rebuker for being so hard.  Never have I heard anyone say the kinds of things that Peter and Nathan said.  “Your money perish with you.”  “You are in the gall of bitterness and the bond of iniquity.”  “Your heart is not right before God.”  “You have despised the word of God.” 
            What examples do we teach instead?  We may not throw people into prison for their words as Ahab and Herod did, but we isolate them from others by spreading tales of “how mean they were to me,” allowing their name and reputation to be chewed up in the rumor mills.  We may not have them murdered as Herodias and Jezebel did, but we do a fine job of character assassination.  We follow faithfully in their evil steps and teach others to do the same when we pat them on the back and agree with their assessment of the one who dared tell them they were wrong.  In other words, we do it out of “love.”  I imagine Herod said the same as he turned the prison key on John, and then signed off on the death warrant.
            Why is this example of how to accept correction so neglected?  Why do we reinforce the examples of evil people instead?  Is it because someday it might be us receiving that rebuke?  Someday it might be our turn to feel the hot embarrassment spreading like a fire across our faces and the acid churning in our stomachs? 
            God meant us to love each other in exactly this way.  Brethren, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness, looking to yourself lest you also be tempted, Gal 6:1.  We all take turns at this.  We all need it.  And I have an important piece of information for you, one that should be obvious but apparently is not:  it never feels “gentle” when you are on the receiving end.  I have knocked myself out prefacing correction with “I love you” statements, with praise for the good in a person’s life, only to have to endure a cold shoulder for weeks or months or even years, only to hear later from others how “mean” I was.  I have also felt that sting of conscience when it was my turn to listen, and even when I knew the person speaking loved me.  But the good God meant to come from these things will be completely lost if all we do is tell the erring brother or sister that it’s just fine to be like Herod and Herodias.
            So you think this isn’t false doctrine?  Then tell me what it is to teach others to be like evil men and women.  Whatever you come up with, it still isn’t right.
 
My brothers, if anyone among you wanders from the truth and someone brings him back, let him know that whoever brings back a sinner from his wandering will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins. James 5:19-20.
 
Dene Ward    

Because of double sessions in the later years, I missed them in high school, but I did have one year in a small town where grades 7-12 were packed into the same school.  Every Friday afternoon during football season, our three afternoon classes were each cut 10 minutes short so we could meet for the final thirty minutes of the day in the gym, cheer with the cheerleaders and their shaking pompoms, clap along with the band until our eardrums nearly burst and our hearts beat in rhythm with the bass drums, and get a gander at those beefy young men—16, 17, 18 years old, bigger than even my own daddy.  As a chubby frizzy-haired 12 year old, it was the closest thing to a riot I ever experienced.  We all yelled and screamed and applauded and hooted at renditions of the opposing team mascot.  We were going to win, we were sure, and we screamed, “We will WIN, WIN, WIN, WIN,” till we all went home hoarse and hyped up on school spirit.
            Sometimes we won, sometimes we lost, but we all showed up again Monday morning, bleary-eyed and less than thrilled to be in our first classes of the day, a long week ahead of us and all thought of football and “Our Great School!” a distant memory.  Pep rallies have their place, but if emotion is all that keeps the spirit going, it isn’t much of a heart is it?
            Elijah found that out on Mt Carmel.  Everyone pictures this great contest as his ultimate victory, perhaps the biggest in the prophet’s life.  They forget to turn the page in their Bibles. 
            Yes, the crowd saw an amazing miracle.  The prophets of Baal called all day to a deaf god made of metal, shouting his name over and over and over.  They tried to get his attention with loud cries, with dancing and with self-mutilation.  No one answered. 
            Elijah on the other hand, made the request as difficult as possible, soaking the sacrifice and the wood and filling up a trench with water till it overflowed.  Did you ever wonder what those poor three-year-drought-stricken people thought as all that water ran off onto the ground?  But none of it mattered when Jehovah sent fire from Heaven that licked it all up in a flash, and consumed the sacrifice—after just one call from Elijah.
            Then the pep rally began in earnest.  The people fell on their faces and said, The Lord, he is God.  The Lord he is God, 1 Kgs 18:39.  Can’t you hear it now?  The chant probably continued on, over and over and over, louder and louder, as Elijah called for the prophets of Baal and slew them all.  The exhilaration he felt must have been amazing.  “We did it, Lord!” he must have thought.  “Finally your people realize there is no God like Jehovah, and they will worship you again.”
            Turn the page. 
            Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done, and how he had killed all the prophets with the sword. Then Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah, saying, "So may the gods do to me and more also, if I do not make your life as the life of one of them by this time tomorrow." Then he was afraid, and he arose and ran for his life...1 Kings 19:1-3.
            Our assemblies have a small element of the pep rally in them.  It is good to cheer one another on, in the same way the men of Antioch laid their hands on Saul and Barnabas, prayed, and sent them on their first preaching trip, Acts 13:1-3.  It is wonderful to encourage a weak soul who has come to us for help.  It fills the heart to sing praises to God and to commune with one another around the Lord’s Table.
            Yet Paul does not spend much time on that emotional aspect of our assemblies in 1 Cor 14, about the clearest picture we have of a first century assembly.  Instead, his constant reminder is “Let all things be done unto edifying,” v 26.  It is, he said, the only thing truly profitable, v 6.  Paul understood that the pep rally aspect of an assembly wouldn’t last beyond the echo of the amen, but good solid teaching would carry one through life.
            If your idea of “getting something out of the services” is that excited, heart-pounding feeling that comes with emotion instead of deeper insight into the Word of God through good teaching and hard study, you are stuck in high school.  Mature people can remain motivated without the hype.  The understanding wrought by hours spent with God in quiet runs deep in their hearts. It keeps them encouraged when times are rough, wise when Satan does his best to deceive, and controlled when temptation pulls every string and pushes every button.
            Pep rally religion doesn’t last, but the Word of God in one’s heart abides forever.
 
Let us know; let us press on to know the LORD; his going out is sure as the dawn; he will come to us as the showers, as the spring rains that water the earth." What shall I do with you, O Ephraim? What shall I do with you, O Judah? Your love is like a morning cloud, like the dew that goes early away...For I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings...If you abide in my Word, you are truly my disciples,  Hosea 6:3-6; John 8:31.
 
Dene Ward

I have to admit this one requires a bit of speculation, even after you gather all the facts, but I think it is worth considering or I would not put it out there.
   Now Sarai, Abram's wife, had borne him no children. She had a female Egyptian servant whose name was Hagar. And Sarai said to Abram, “Behold now, the LORD has prevented me from bearing children. Go in to my servant; it may be that I shall obtain children by her.” And Abram listened to the voice of Sarai (Gen 16:1-2).
   Where did Hagar come from?  Abraham went to Egypt almost immediately after he left Haran.  He was 75 then and 86 when Ishmael was born, so 10 years passed between the time he went to Egypt and the time he took Hagar as a wife (Gen 12:4; 16:16).  Several Old Testament scholars say that when girls reached puberty in those ancient Near East cultures, they were considered marriageable, possibly as young as 14.  People want to say that the ancients were malnourished and would have had a much later puberty, but these were rich people we are talking about here.  I doubt if malnourishment was an issue.  By the first century, at least one scholar says that girls were betrothed at 13 and married at 14.  Even 14 is two to three years later than today's girls reach puberty so I can easily imagine that Hagar was about that age or maybe a year older, but not much more than that.
   So it is plausible that Abraham and Sarah acquired Hagar's mother when they went to Egypt—possibly as a gift from Pharaoh (Gen 12:16), and that she brought with her a four to five year old daughter who grew up in Abraham's house.  From that righteous couple she must have learned about God.  Read the encounters she had with "the angel of the LORD" and the "angel of God" (Genesis 16 and 21) and see for yourself.  Truly I have seen Him who looks after me (Gen 16:13) does not sound like a pagan idea of God.
   Now add to this the servant who is sent to get Isaac a wife (Gen 24), who prayed to God and trusted Him to answer that prayer.  "Abraham…has clearly taught his household about the God he follows.  Not only does this servant pray—itself an indication that he knows God—he is confident God can act immediately and decisively and will do so because God has a special relationship with his master" (Our Eyes Are on You, Nathan Ward, p 10).  These two servants grew up in and/or lived in Abraham's household.  They saw their worship, their faith, and their absolute trust in God.  And that brought them to at least some and possibly a full degree of faith themselves.  Remember, despite Abraham sending Hagar and Ishmael away at God's order, Ishmael still returned to Abraham's burial roughly seventy years later (Gen 25:7-9).  Somehow, a connection continued.
   So here is the lesson.  Would someone growing up in our home, or perhaps simply growing up next door, see the kind of faith Abraham and Sarah had?  Would they even have heard the name of the God we worship and have seen us in prayer and study?  Would they have seen how God was pivotal in our decisions and actions?
   Abraham and Sarah made their share of mistakes, but the majority of their lives acted as a sound testimony of their faith.  What about ours?

For I have chosen him, that he may command his children and his household after him to keep the way of the LORD by doing righteousness and justice, so that the LORD may bring to Abraham what he has promised him (Gen 18:19).

Dene Ward

Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, Eph 5:25
            Abraham married his half-sister Sarah.  He was surrounded by polygamy.  His friends and neighbors in Ur and later in Canaan were likely polygamists. He was wealthy and polygamy was far more common among the rich.  It took money to support several wives and a few dozen children.  And—Sarah had not given him an heir.  That alone would have been cause for the men of that place and era to find a second, or even third wife.  I can just imagine a neighbor stopping by and saying, "Abraham, my daughter is marriageable now.  She is healthy and could give you the children Sarah has not."  I can even imagine that happening several times. 
            But Abraham did not succumb for decades.  He was 85 when Sarah finally prevailed upon him to take Hagar as a second wife, a concubine since she was a servant.  (Concubines are wives of second rank. Gen 16:3).  It took Sarah's great love for her husband and great faith in the plan of God—that there had to be an heir for the promises to come about—before he would even think of doing so.
            Somehow, this man of God had learned the Divine Plan of God for marriage—one man for one woman for one lifetime—and had lived up to it, even among rampant, and culturally acceptable, polygamy.  This man had learned to love his wife "as his own body" thousands of years before Paul put it into words.
            We miss all that because none of us would have ever even dreamed of polygamy to solve the problem.   We miss it because monogamy is second nature to us.  We miss the love this man had for his wife, even after she had grown old and unable to bear him a child, a child God said had to be born for all those promises He made to come about.  Still he was willing to wait, willing to be satisfied with the woman he had originally chosen, when no one else he knew would have.
            And how many of us become dissatisfied over the trivial, dissatisfied enough to trade one in for a new model, as the old saying goes?  How many of us can match the devotion these two people had for each other through thick or thin, for richer or for poorer, for better or for worse?  How many of us jump at the first "worse" there is to get out of it?
            See what you miss when you don't study the culture of the times?  See what you miss when you think we are so much smarter, so much wiser, so much more knowledgeable about God than those ancient people were?  Drop your baggage at the door and see what they have to teach you.
 
In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself.  For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body. “Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” (Eph 5:28-31)
 
Dene Ward

By faith Abraham, when he was called, obeyed to go out unto a place which he was to receive for an inheritance; and he went out, not knowing whither he went. By faith he became a sojourner 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: for he looked for the city which hath the foundations, whose builder and maker is God (Heb 11:8-10).
            I have heard it said, and even, I am afraid, thought that way myself at least a little bit, what was the big sacrifice Abraham and Sarah made when they left Ur?  They lived in ancient times with no modern conveniences, and in a primitive culture where things like architecture and the arts were not important at all.  There's that intellectual snobbery raising its ugly head.
            Go online.  Look in books like the Zondervan Bible Encyclopedia or the Holman Bible Atlas.  In the first place, the Sumerian culture was an alliance of city states of which Ur was just one.  Each had its own king who ruled the surrounding lands and villages.  A ziggarut sat at the city center with a shrine to the patron deity of the city.  And now you see one reason God wanted Abraham and Sarah out of there.
            In addition we have found in the tombs gold jewelry, daggers, helmets, and lyres—art and music did exist in that culture.  Among the many ruins archaeologists have found economic documents, medical treatises, law codes, agricultural manuals, a writing about a Great Flood, and philosophical writings.  They have found canals used for irrigating crops.  They have discovered that Ur had an educational system, some form of both hot and cold municipal running water, a sewer system, and paved roads.  So much for primitive, huh?
I also found a couple of artists' renditions of the typical upper class home—based on the ruins.  Have you ever been to the Columbia Restaurant in Tampa?  Go to www.opentable.com/Columbia-restaurant-ybor-city.  Look for the room with the fountain in the middle, with balconies overlooking a central room below, and that is similar to the picture of the house in Ur that I found.  Make no mistake, Abraham was a wealthy man.  This home could quite easily have been the one he left.  Now tell me it was no big deal for him to leave all that behind and live in tents for the rest of his life!  As an experienced camper, I know for certain that Sarah put up with sand in her sandals, in her blankets, and in her food!  They left a life of relative luxury to wander for decades in a hot, dirty land.
           Abraham and Sarah most certainly did sacrifice in order to follow God, even from the beginning, far more than most of us have ever been called to sacrifice, or maybe ever will.  Think hard today about your commitment to God and what you are willing to sacrifice for Him.  Even the best of us are far too materialistic and addicted to convenience and ease.  Perhaps we need a wake-up call.
 
These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth. For they that say such things make it manifest that they are seeking after a country of their own. And if indeed they had been mindful of that country from which they went out, they would have had opportunity to return. But now they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly: wherefore God is not ashamed of them, to be called their God; for he hath prepared for them a city (Heb 11:13-16).
 
Dene Ward
 

Our culture gets in the way of our Bible study far too often.  It is a lesson taught to me by a younger woman about twenty years ago.  During that class we were discussing the wives of David and the problems that might have caused—all of them being wives of the same man.  Naturally the idea of jealousy and resentment came up first, and we discussed that for several minutes. Finally this young woman spoke up and said, "I don't think we have any idea how those women felt.  They grew up with the idea of polygamy.  It was all around them, especially in the neighboring countries, and even among the richer Israelites.  They knew from the beginning that they might find themselves in this situation.  Their own mothers might have been in that situation.  How can we who are used to monogamy even imagine what they were feeling?"
            I knew immediately that she was correct.  We carry our cultural baggage into our Bible study when we need to be dropping it off at the study door.  The only way to know how these women might have felt is to talk to a woman who has experienced it since none of us have.
            And because of our cultural baggage we miss a lot of other examples in the Biblical text.  Lately, I find lessons in passages I have studied for years, even decades, without ever seeing before.  I suppose that some of these things just take age and experience to realize, as well as hour after hour of study. 
            And there are other problems as well.  When you have studied something for years, it is difficult to enter into it again without remembering all the things you have already discovered or thought about.  It is especially difficult if you have them written all over your Bible.  It will be practically impossible to see anything new.  My husband and a couple of the Florida College Bible faculty have openly recommended that you only write in one Bible and leave your study Bible blank for exactly that reason.  You may think those little squiggles won't influence you as you study the passage anew, but you are wrong.  It's like the elephant in the room—they are there and you can't help but think about them, even if you try to make a point not to read them.  And if you are young and absolutely sure that such is not the case with you, please take a step back and think about the arrogance of chucking advice from older, wiser, and far more knowledgeable heads.
            And then there is the old intellectual snobbery problem.  We think we are so much smarter than those "primitive" people back then, and that our culture is so much more enlightened.  And that effectively wipes out some of the more important lessons they can teach us.  And so I plan to present a series of lessons we might have missed.  I really do not know how long this series will last.  It might stop and then start again when I find other lessons I have not yet thought of.  For now, most of these will revolve around Abraham and Sarah.
            We will begin next week, one lesson a week to give you time to absorb something new, but in the meantime, let me challenge you to start reading all those old Bible narratives, look again at those characters, and see if you can find something new yourself.  Perhaps you can share your discoveries with me as we go along.  I would love to hear them.
 
Wherefore also it was reckoned unto [Abraham] for righteousness. Now it was not written for his sake alone, that it was reckoned unto him; but for our sake also, unto whom it shall be reckoned, who believe on him that raised Jesus our Lord from the dead (Rom 4:22-24).
 
Dene Ward

The days of our years are threescore years and ten, Or even by reason of strength fourscore years; Yet is their pride but labor and sorrow; For it is soon gone, and we fly away (Ps 90:10).
 
At times your mind tends to wander to places it never has before, but probably should have.  When you reach that general rule the psalmist talks about, "threescore and ten," it suddenly dawns on you that anything can happen any day now.  Of course that is true for any age, but now it is true many times over.  I have known people who seemed perfectly healthy in their mid-70s, but who suddenly received a grim diagnosis and were gone in a few months.  Others have been felled by a sudden heart attack, and still others simply did not wake the next morning.
            Then you begin to think about the days ahead in a different way.  I just started a new women's Bible study group.  This study usually takes 2-3 years with a class that meets every week for an hour during the school year.  But this particular group meets once a month for 90 minutes.  It could take us 8-9 years to finish.  Who is to say that I will be able to finish it?
            And then you consider your grandchildren.  My son followed his father's example and did not have his first child until he was thirty.  If his son does the same, I am not likely to see any great-grandchildren.  And that led to some thoughts about the great characters of the Bible.  Abraham lived to be 175.  Isaac was born when he was 100 and had his two sons at 60.  So Jacob and Esau did know their grandfather Abraham, and were 15 at his death (Gen 25:7).  Somehow you never think of Abraham seeing his grandchildren, much less long enough to have developed any kind of relationship with them.
            In the same vein, you can figure out, if you start at his age at death and work backwards, that Jacob was 77 when he went to Haran and 84 when he married his two very young cousins.  Doesn't that put a wrinkle in the heel of your socks!?  And, you can also figure that his first eleven sons and at least one daughter were born in a span of no more than 10 years, maybe as little as 6 or 7.  That's what happens with four wives whose pregnancies can overlap.
            Yes, my mind wanders in strange places sometimes, and what in the world does this have to do with anything anyway?  Well, you may not be my age, but you certainly know people who are there.  Probably your elders and many of the Bible class teachers in your congregation, as well some of the pillars all of you depend upon.  Where will they be in ten years?  In twenty?  Probably gone, and will you be ready to take their places?  It took them many years to gain the knowledge and wisdom they have.  That means it's time for you to begin preparing to take their places.  It's time for you to begin serious study, and to start putting it into practice while they are still around to advise you.  And if you are one of those who thinks they don't need the old fuddy-duddies and their outdated way of doing things, it's time to get an attitude adjustment while you still have someone to fall back on when you make a serious blunder or two.
            And more than that, it's time to get your life before God aligned with his Word.  You may not even have threescore and ten.  I have known far too many young men and women die before they leave their forties, some without warning.  Yes, it can happen to you, too.
            Sometimes thinking rambling thoughts can be a little silly, a little ridiculous, even.  But sometimes they can lead you where you need to go for the sake of your soul.  Sit still long enough, quiet enough, with nothing else in your hands once in a while to think them.
 
It is better to go to the house of mourning than to go to the house of feasting: for that is the end of all men; and the living will lay it to his heart (Eccl 7:2).
 
Dene Ward