We've Been Here Before . . . Repeating the Same Mistake

  Introduction  

     Would you agree, it is one thing to live a story, another to tell a story, and yet another to comprehend the meaning behind a story that you have neither lived nor told?  I was listening to one of my daughters and her friend discuss how a teacher would pull out the craziest metaphors from a book they were required to read and discuss.  They giggled about several examples like the 'blue' curtains and the 'yellow' bird and how their teacher expected them to understand that theses colors represented more than just a palette.  I found it fascinating and quite entertaining to listen to their perspectives.  Bear with me today as I attempt to do the same with the repeating story of “She’s My Sister.”    Although we do not come from the patriarchal period, nor are we all that familiar with Middle Eastern culture, I believe we can be confident that God included this story in history to be relatable and informative.  Within this story, we learn of an arranged marriage, one sanctioned by the couple’s parents, and in fulfillment of a plan that God had set in place before their birth.  This historical story found in Genesis has a purpose.  Can we agree that hidden within this story, there is likely a principle, not just an icky story-line intended to turn our stomachs?    

     When we read Scriptures, it should be our intent to increase our understanding.  The more times we read a given passage, the layers of the story begin to make more sense.  Today I write about the personal revelation that came through the Holy Spirits guidance as I studied the life of Abram and Sarai as told by Moses.  You will see me shift from their original names to the names God assigns to them midway through this article.  Although God projects new identities through name changes, Abram to Abraham, and Sarai to Sarah, we see that old patterns still emerged.  Abram means 'exalted father' and Sarai means 'princess;' whereas,  Abraham means 'father of many,' and Sarah means 'My princess.'  Her historical position was elevated through God's blessing.

     As a woman reading this story, it is easy to become indignant with the man (Abram) when we see that his introduction of Sarai puts her at risk to save his own skin.  He didn’t do this just once, the text tells us he did this twice, but one might even surmise it happened multiple times when we read his defense to Abimelech, the King of Grier.   By the way, Abimelech is not a name, but a titled position.  There are more than one Abimelech's in the book of Genesis.  Abimelech means 'prince, or son of a king.'  In this story, he is now the king.  

     We could call this story, “She is my Sister,” or just as easily, “Pete and Repeat.”  The story is first told in chapter 12 of Genesis, and repeats itself in chapter 20 of the same book.  This story repeats, not because it might pass our notice the first time.  I believe it is repeated because God wants us to know how easy it is to fall back into old familiar patterns.  As a believer in Jesus Christ, we also have experienced an identity change and are just as likely to find ourselves repeating old familiar patterns.  When reading this story, it is best when we understand the characters and their relationships to one another.  Let me begin by giving the back story.  

The Back Story

     Abram is one of three sons born to Terah in Ur of the Chaldeans.  He has two brothers and a sister.  His oldest brother, Nahor II, was named after his dad’s dad.  Abram’s other brother, Haran, had at least two children, Lot and Milcah, a boy and a girl.  We learn from the story that Abram had an arranged marriage with his half-sister, born of another mother.  Her name was Sarai.  Abram’s surviving brother had married the deceased brother’s daughter, Her name was Milcah.  The practice of marrying close relatives is called consanguineous marriages.  Although rare in most parts of the world, it had been more prevalent in the region of Abram and Sarai’s birth.  

     Abram received a calling from the Lord to move from the home of his father and his kindred to Canaan.  Terah began the journey out of Ur to pasture his animals in northern Mesopotamia for an unknown period of time.  They lived in Harran until the death of Abram's father who lived to be 205 years old.  Since he bore no children until the age of 70, it is hard to know whether Abram and his siblings were children or adults when they moved as far as this region.  Abram was 75 when his father passed away.  This is when he, Sarai, and his nephew, Lot, continued their journey onward.  This family was the descendants of the late Shem, Noah’s oldest son who had been instructed to be fruitful and multiply and spread throughout the earth.

     Abram had spent his whole life with Sarai, the two were probably very compatible travel partners since they were raised under the same roof.  As they set off for Canaan, their common history probably brought great comfort as they ventured into the unknown.  Their relationship probably seemed very normal until they began to encounter other cultures and marriage customs.  As they arrived in Shechem at the oaks of Moreh, they received confirmation from God that they had arrived in the land of promise.  Abram built an altar to the Lord.  One would recognize that Abram had been obedient in his submission to God’s will.

     Not long after, Abram move his tent a little further south.  Was he just exploring the land,  had wandering gotten into his blood, or was he feeling restless?  He built a second altar to the Lord between Bethel and Ai.  Could this be his final destination?  Abram had come from an arid desert region in the north where they had raised livestock.  They knew how to support a growing herd and people in this environment.  Receiving no instructions from God, for some unknown reason, Abram relocates again in the Negeb, a desert on the edge of the wilderness where it would be more difficult to survive.  It is hard to say what motivated his decision to move, could it be that he found it challenging to be neighborly with the Canaanites?  Did his sense of adventure cause him to wonder what was just over that next peak, or past the last oasis?  It was almost as if he had missed the '“X” marks the spot' on the map which he was suppose to call home.  Then we learn a famine arose.  

     Rather than return to the north, we see Abram move beyond the Negeb toward more fertile soil, in the delta of the Nile (Egypt).  This is where his deception is revealed.  Is this the part in the story where Abram begins to design his own journey and decide things for himself?  The story tells us that Abram feared the loss of his life because of Sarai’s beauty.  He asked her go by a different identity, he says, 'present yourself as my sister.'  Abram reasoned that a foreign man would kill for a beautiful woman holding no remorse over the murder of her husband.  He discovered, as a brother, he would be accepted and even rewarded for such a treasure.  Can you imagine Abram’s bag, packed with passport, a work permit, a large Yeti filled with ice, an ATM machine to convert his currency, a quill pen for signing a contract, and a bartering agreement to exchange his wife for wealth.  He seemed equipped to make his home among these foreigners beyond the land that God had promised.  His belly was full.  

     All jokes aside.  Abram sensed danger, and he reacted to that danger using a survival technique, he told a half-truth, which was also a half-lie.  Back-peddling doesn’t always get us back to the location from hence we came.  Abram had chosen a path of deception.  How do you imagine that Sarai felt when she realized that Abram was releasing her to another man’s harem?  How did she feel when she watched Abram’s livestock and wealth increase while she was offered as a possession?  Do you imagine that Abram felt any guilt or remorse?  We do not see the couple make any effort to ask God for a solution.  If God interceded because of prayer, it was on Sarai's behalf that He heard her cry.  Often it is crisis that brings us to our knees.  This story does not reveal that either Abram or Sarai called on God.  It is probably safer to assume that because of omission from the story, they did not.

God Covenant with Abram  

     If we look at the specific language of God’s covenant with Abram found in Genesis 12:2-3, we read that God made many promises to Abram, but didn’t require anything in return.  He said:  (1)  I will make of you a great nation, (2)  I will bless you with a great name, (3) I will bless those who bless you, and (4) I will curse those who dishonor you.

     Did Pharaoh bring dishonor to Abram or was it the other way around?  While Abram prospered at the hand of Pharaoh, a curse fell upon the man who blessed him.  This didn’t line up with what God had said.  God told Abram that with the blessing he received, he was to bring a blessing to others and eventually the whole earth would be blessed.  Abram is on the receiving end, but by verse 17 we see God intervenes for Sarai.  God offers the protection and security she deserved from her husband.  God sees our heartaches and intervenes for us too.  

     As I read this account, I couldn't help but briefly ponder the similarities to the story of Jonah when he fled God's command to go to Nineveh.  Jonah went in the opposite direction and who suffered when he was asleep in the bowels of the boat?  It was those who hoped to keep the boat afloat.  In this story, who suffered, not Abram?  After removing Jonah for the boat, and Abram from Egypt, we could expect that God no longer needed to torment those who accompanied the sinning believer.  Both men would find their way back to God's plan, for awhile.  

Genesis 13:3–4 (ESV) 

 And he journeyed on from the Negeb as far as Bethel to the place where his tent had been at the beginning, between Bethel and Ai, ⁴ to the place where he had made an altar at the first. And there Abram called upon the name of the Lord.   

As Jonah was deposited on dry land, where he had first departed from God’s path; likewise Abram found himself back at the altar from which he wandered from God.  We may see why Jonah didn't want to go to Nineveh, but one might wonder why Abram had left Canaan in favor of the arid region of the Negeb.  Arid means having little or no rain, too dry or barren to support vegetation.  Was the famine caused by lack of rain in Canaan, or only in the desert where he had relocated?  Why did he not return to the "X" on God's map?  Was Abram establishing his own steps?  Did he not trust God with his future?  

     As the story progresses, Abram seems to be walking more closely with God for a while when he generously offers the pick of land to which his nephew chose the best grazing territory.   Then Abram leaves his home to rescues Lot from harm.  This is where he meets the high priest and king of Salem to which he offers first fruits of the spoils of battle.  Abram negotiates on behalf of the righteous men in Sodom but later learns that only his nephew and Lot's two daughters would survive the ordeal.  Then we see Abram wander back into the desert.  What would provoke him to return?  

The Whole Story

     By the end of chapter 19, Abram is standing in the distance watching the smoke rise from the ash of Sodom.  Lot's wife has been turned into a pillar of salt and Lot has now discovered that he will be the father to not only his sons, but also his grandsons (one in the same).  Abrams old story, "She is My Sister" returns to the language of his lips.  Had Lot's relationship with his daughters caused Abraham to reflect on his own arranged marriage?  Why would Abraham return to the desert?  Why would he offer his wife to Abimelech (the current King of Gerar)?  One could surmise that Abraham, as God now calls him, went to Gerar is search of supplies and food from the Negeb.  But one can no longer reason that Sarah's 90-year-old body held any appeal to men of foreign regions.  How did Abraham find himself in this precarious position? 

     We might expect to see an episode like this on Jerry Springer, but would not expect to see godly Sarah getting caught up in such a story, once again.  Would this result in a  paternity suit, as Sarah claimed that Abraham was the real Daddy of Isaac?  Remember that the angel had just promised Abraham and Sarah that they would be parents within one year.  This had not happened yet.  Why participate in risky behavior?  Once again, God needed to intervene on Sarah's behalf.  God made it clear that Abimelech had intentions.  It was only because of God's intervention that he had not done the unthinkable.  God had also closed all the wombs of women in the region.  Imagine that every woman was on her menstrual cycle simultaneously.  Heaven help the men!!  God also made it clear to Abimelech that his life was on the line; he was to right this wrong.  Was it he, or Abraham and Sarah that had created this ill-fated event?  

     Abimelech called Abraham to speak the truth.  His first question, "What have you done to us (v. 9a)?"  Then, "How have I sinned against you, that you have brought upon me and my kingdom great sin(v. 9b)?"   Abimelech went on to accuse him, “You have done to me things that ought not be done(v.9c)?”  Everything Abimelech had said was true.  As Abimelech asks Abraham to explain, let's consider how a man of God could so misrepresent appropriate behavior.  As you will see, Abraham blows his first argument.   

     Abraham’s response is very revealing.  He passes blame back on Abimelech’s people when he said, “I did it because I thought, ‘There is no fear of God at all in this place, and they will kill me because of my wife.’"  This response is called hypocrisy.  Then he said, “Besides, she is indeed my sister, the daughter of my father though not the daughter of my mother, and she became my wife (v.12)."  This is a flawed way of excusing oneself by twisted truth.  And then Abraham blames God, “And when God caused me to wander from my father’s house, I said to her, ‘This is the kindness you must do me: at every place to which we come, say of me, “He is my brother (v.13)."  This is justifying ones’ actions rather than offering an apology.  Abraham drew Sarah into his sin, and neither took ownership of this misrepresentation.  This is the flip side of “The devil made me do it.”  Did you notice that he said, God caused him to wander?  We know that God asked Abraham to wander from Harran to Canaan, but who asked him to wander further south and west?  Abraham may have been obedient to God's initial calling, but did he continue to walk in righteousness?  Was his heart set on God's plan or his plan.  Who was establishing his steps?  

     We can see a man favored by God, yet willing to place the blame outside himself to justify his actions and make excuses.  How easy would it have been for Abimelech to say, "apology accepted" when no apology was offered.  Abraham's wanderings took him further away from God, but we see God draw him back into fellowship.  What does that wandering look like for us?  As we wander away from God, might it be more likely that we are willing to spin the truth as Abraham did?  When caught in our actions, are we willing to take ownership, or use justification and excuse as our defense?  Abraham had not yet learned what it meant to be fully submitted to God’s authority and desire for his life.  He was not living an 'ALL IN' submission, nor do we.  God continued to love Abraham and Sarah, and He will continue to love us when we make mistakes, even repeated mistakes.  Like Abraham, God will test our faith to determine how much we place our trust in Him.  This testing was not for God's sake, but for Abraham's so that he would understand full submission to the will of God.  Could we expect similar testing too?