Genesis 25 – With Sarah deceased, Abraham marries again (Keturah) and has another six sons – a strange ending to the story of this man who was said to be 100 when his son Isaac was born. He must be nearly 120 at this point. All of the progeny of this period are sent to the east. Abraham dies at 175 and is buried with Sarah.

Isaac makes his home near the well of Lahai-roi (well of the Living One who sees me) in the Negev Desert

Ishmael’s 12 sons…

Genesis 24:33-67 - They show the servant of Abraham great hospitality; he tells them the whole story about Abraham – his success in making the move he did and the prosperity he came into with God’s help. He explains why his master sent him and how he came to believe that Rebekah was the intended bride for Isaac.

After hearing all the details, Laban and Bethuel [Rebekah’s brother] agree to the marriage; they only ask that she remain with them for ten days. Abraham’s…

Genesis 24:1-32 – Abraham is now a very old man. He asks his oldest servant, “the man in charge of his household” (24:2) to take and oath “by putting [his] hand under [his] thigh” (24:2) and swearing that he “will not allow [his] son [Isaac] to marry one of these local Canaanite women” (24:3). He wants his steward to find a woman from the house of Abraham’s father in Haran. He makes it clear he does not want Isaac to travel there EVER. The steward is to go there on his own and…

Genesis 22 - God puts Abraham to the test at Moriah (said to be where Jerusalem would later be built).  “Take your son, your only son—yes, Isaac, who you love so much—and go to the land of Moriah. Go and sacrifice him as a burnt offering on one of the mountains, which I will show you” (22:2).

Abraham obeys. On the third day of travel, Abraham spies the place he’s been told to go to in the distance. He tells the men with him to stay while he and Isaac go…

Genesis 20 - A doublet of 12:10, but involving not the king of Egypt but the King of Gerar, a kingdom south of Gaza, Abimelech.  Abimelech has a dream from God revealing the truth of what Abraham is doing and he confronts Abraham.  The idea of God’s prophets being favored and being people who can intercede with God for us is reinforced here (20:7). Abraham learns that there is fear and respect for God outside his own people, so at Abraham’s intercession, God does…

Genesis 19 - Two angel messengers are entertained by Lot whose hospitality is implicitly praised.  The men of the town beat at his door demanding that he turn them over to them so they can “abuse” them –“be intimate with them” [Tanakh 19:5]. There is virtually no discussion or follow up on the particular evil implied.  The whole focus is on the fact that destruction will come, but the virtuous Lot and those he loves are given a path to follow to avoid the…

Genesis 18 - This chapter shows us Abraham sitting at the entrance to his tent near a small tree called a Terebinth at Mamre.  It is just getting to the hot part of the day, when three strangers appear.  Abraham runs over to them and begs them to accept hospitality from him. 

He enlists Sarah’s help and arranges for meat and cheese to be offered.  While they are eating, they ask where his wife is and one of them says “I will surely return to you about this time next…

Genesis 16 - There is still one hurdle Abraham must negotiate—the human solution that his wife Sarai dreams up. Sarai, discouraged with her own infertility and not quite as ready as Abram is simply to trust in the word of God they have received becomes impatient and comes up with her own plan to make the promise of God come to pass.  

She offers Abram her maidservant Hagar with the idea that perhaps any children that result might be considered hers. …

Genesis 14 - There is a war in the region between the kings of Shinar (Amraphel), Ellasar (Arioch), Elam (Chedorlaomer) and Goiim (Tidal) and the kings of Sodom , Gomorrah, Admah, Zeboiim and Bela. 

The first league of kings is victorious and in seizing the possession and food supplies of Sodom and Gomorrah, they sweep up Abram’s nephew Lot and all he owns.  Abram then goes and with 318 of his retainers, he recaptures Lot and his possessions and brings them…

Chapters 12 through 25 embrace the story of Abraham

Genesis 12 - Abraham is the next “Seed of Eve” by whom redemption will come to man, the first having been Noah.

God addresses Abram and tells him to leave Haran, the home of his father’s clan, to go to “a land that I will show you” (12:1). And then come the great promises – that God will make of him a great nation, that He will make Abram’s name great and him a blessing to “all the communities…

Genesis 9 - God makes a covenant with Noah, expanding Noah’s “dominion” over the creation by giving him meat to eat as well as plants, providing man refrains from eating the blood of the animals, for the blood is the life of the animal and “the life” is God’s in a special way--man’s lifeblood especially for God will require “an accounting” for the “life” that is so precious to him:

“I will require the blood of anyone who takes another person’s life. If a wild…

Genesis 8 - For a 150 days, the waters are at their crest.  Then God “remembered Noah and all the wild animals and livestock with him in the boat. He sent a wind to blow across the earth, and the floodwaters began to recede” (8:1-2). After another 150 days, the “boat came to rest on the mountains of Ararat” (8:4).  Then 40 days later, Noah sends out a raven, and then a dove.  Three periods of 7 days are required until the dove can leave permanently. 

Noah…

Genesis 6 – “Then the people began to multiply on the earth, and daughters were born to them. The sons of God saw the beautiful women and took any they wanted as their wives” (6:1-2).  This story of the “sons of god” are mythological deities mating with the daughters of man and presumably bringing forth the Nephilim, from whom the heroes of men arose. The Greek myths we are familiar with are full of these stories of gods and goddesses…

Genesis 4 - The two first children of woman are Cain and Abel, a tiller of the ground (now cursed) and a tender of sheep (4:2). Their story will introduce a recurring Old Testament pattern or theme – that in a world where the eldest son always was seen as the favored one, it will be the younger, the less “important” child who will always be favored by God.

We see them here offering the work of their hands to the Lord. Cain gives…

Genesis 3 - Now the drama begins.  There is a serpent in the garden who approaches the woman and asks her if God forbade them any of the fruits of the garden, and Eve tells him of the prohibition on the tree of the knowledge of good and evil along with the threatened penalty, which I must point out is a prohibition given to Adam – before Eve was even part of the picture! She has HEARD of the prohibition from Adam. 

The…

Genesis 2 – God rests on the seventh day.  The day therefore becomes blessed and hallowed. Then we go on to another story of man’s creation. It is not completely consistent with the details of the first, but its focus is wholly on the place of man in the creation, man’s role in “naming” all that is, and relations between the man and the woman created.

Here the creation of man occurs before the bringing forth of vegetation and rain upon the earth.  There was a…

Genesis 1 - God creates the universe and the earth and by his word light came forth that was good and pleasing to God, not the light of the sun, for that is created later, on day four; not the light that physically gives us the experience of day and night—that too is not the focus.  The light that is created in the very beginning is a light that simply is with God in the beginning of his creation—a presence, perhaps a power that is brought forth to be a presence in and…

Psalm 145 – “I will thank you forever and ever. Every day I will thank you; I will praise you forever and ever” (145:2).

What you have done will be praised throughout the generations. “The Lord is loving and merciful, show to become angry and full of constant love” (145:8).

The Lord is faithful to his promises and helps those in trouble. He “lifts those who have fallen” (145:14).

Psalm 146 – “Don’t put your trust in human leaders”…

Psalm 142 – A prayer for God’s help. To Him I bring all my complaints, all my despair. No one seems to care for me, so I cry to you for help: “you are all I really want in this life” (142:5).

Psalm 143 – “Do not put your servant on trial, for no one is innocent in your sight” (143:2).

And he asks God to kill his enemies, destroy those who oppress him. “I lift my hands to you in prayer. I thirst for you as parched land…

 Psalm 138 – This is a psalm of thanksgiving for God’s constant love and teaching. “I give you thanks, O Lord, with all my heart; I will sing your praises before the gods” (138:1). This must have been written before Yahweh had become the ONLY god, when He was only the HIGHEST god.

“You answered me when I called to you; with your strength you strengthened me” (138:3).

“Though the Lord is great, he cares for the…