ISAAC INTREATED THE LORD FOR HIS WIFE

We can have every confidence in the promises of God. After all, if a promise is only as good as the person who makes it, it follows that the promises of God must be thoroughly reliable. The Apostle Paul refers to the ‘hope of eternal life, which God, that cannot lie, promised before the world began’, Titus 1. 2. Bible promises are completely trustworthy, not only because it is God who makes them, but because it is Christ who fulfils them; ‘For all the promises of God in him are yea, and in him Amen’, 2 Cor. 1. 20. Prayer will be a lifeless routine if we do not really believe that God intends to fulfil His promises, and is fully able to do so.

God made it clear to Abraham that ‘in Isaac shall thy seed be called’, Gen. 21. 12. But there had been times when it was far from easy to see the fulfilment of His promise, Gen. 17. 7. Even Abraham, that great man of faith, exclaimed, ‘Lord God, what wilt thougive me, seeing Igo childless’, Gen. 15. 2, and now Isaac faces the same problem; ‘And Isaac intreated the Lord for his wife, because she was barren’.

Whilst we cannot doubt the earnestness and intensity of Isaac’s prayer, it was certainly not a bitter complaint. The Hebrew scholar GESENIUS explains that the word ‘intreat’ means ‘to pray as a suppliant’, and adds, ‘the prayers of the godly being compared to incense’. What a beautiful way in which to approach God! Isaac prayed with a worshipful spirit. Like us at times, he found difficulty with God’s timetable, but this did not rob him of adoration for God. All are obliged to say, ‘As for God, his way is perfect’, Ps. 18. 30. God must have found great pleasure in the way that Isaac handled the delay and disappointment in his life, especially as he had to wait twenty years before his prayers were answered, vv. 20, 26. Perhaps we too have waited many long years for answers to prayer.

But God ‘that cannot lie’ did hear the prayers of Isaac; ‘And the Lord was intreated of him, and Rebekah his wife conceived’. Centuries later, in similar circumstances, God assured Zacharias that his prayer was heard, even though an answer seemed impossible, Luke 1. 5-13. Don’t ever lose confidence in God.