Tue.’s Devo - From Famine to Prosperity

Read Gen. 26:1-17

When there is a famine in the land it means that the people have turned from God and God is judging the land in hopes of turning them back to him so he can heal them and the land.  So, that is where we find ourselves in today’s reading.  Notice, it was the second famine since Abraham had been born.  Isaac is in the land of the Philistines and God specifically tells Isaac not to go to Egypt and that God will tell him where to go.  If he will do this he and his posterity will be blessed and all the countries God leads him through will one day be his.  God wanted him to walk out his inheritance.  It was always the tendency to escape to Egypt when they were going through a famine instead to staying and sticking it out.  Naomi and her sons escaped the famine to go to Egypt and she lost everything there.  It is also our tendency to try to escape hard times when God wants us to stay and let him carry us through it and perform miracles for us in the trials.  Isaac obeyed God and didn’t flee to Egypt but he fell to the fear of the men in Gerar.  He followed the sin of his father and lied about his wife.  Because of his fear of dying, he told the people that Rebekah was his sister, not his wife.  The king happened to look out his window and see Isaac and Rebekah behaving like husband and wife instead of brother and sister so he called Isaac in and rebuked him.  The king was furious that Isaac would lie and cause potential sin to come to his people.  So he protected Isaac with a death sentence to anyone who touched them.  I think the king was offended that Isaac would feel like he needed to lie for his own safety.  Isaac stayed in that land and planted seed.  His harvest was 100%.  That is amazing, especially in the first year.  Only God could do that.  He grew very rich and powerful.  So much so, that the Philistines envied his success.  Envy leads to sin.  The Philistines put dirt in all the wells Abraham had dug.  Finally, the Philistine king asked Isaac to leave because he was becoming too powerful and he was afraid he would take over. So Isaac went into the valley of Gerar.

Lord, help us to not run from our trials but to wait on you to bring a harvest.