Adapted from She, Volume 4/pp 57-58
Today’s Scripture Reading: Genesis 25 and Ephesians 3:20
From being barren for twenty long years to a complicated pregnancy to delivering twins, the road to having children was not an easy one for Rebekah and Isaac.1 Unlike today, barrenness in the days of Isaac and Rebekah came not only with the disappointment women experience today but with the added stigma of social shame and disgrace. This was in large part due to the cultural beliefs that childbearing was equated with a blessing from God and/or a woman’s worth. So, like Hannah and others2 we have studied in our journey through the women of the Bible, barrenness could frustrate marriages or have crushing mental effects on a woman who struggled to conceive.
Rebekah also serves as an example that when we feel barren God can intervene. She, volume 4/p58
I particularly appreciate one of the commentaries by Biblehub.com, which points out (and I paraphrase) that the stigma not only affected the barren woman but also her husband and extended family. However, as the commentator points out, God often used these situations “as a backdrop for miraculous divine intervention.” I know the reality of this statement from my own years of barrenness, and I am forever grateful for God’s sovereign timing (divine intervention) in opening not only my womb but my mind and heart to His saving grace and mercy. These gifts (mercy and grace) led me out of the physical barrenness, but also out of the hopelessness and spiritual wilderness I had been wandering in for far too long.
Her husband prayed to the Lord on his wife’s behalf.
While our focus is on Rebekah in this part of our journey through God’s Word, it should also be noted, as the my study journal points out that Isaac prayed for his wife because she was barren and the Lord heard Isaac’s plea and God gave them even more than they asked for, or, as He so often does ~ He gave them exceedingly abundantly more than he asked or even imagined (Eph 3:20). When it came time for her to deliver she delivered twin boys. In Genesis 25:23 the Lord had described them to her as “two nations…two manner of people would come from her…one would be stronger and the other would serve the younger. Of course, if you know the story of Jacob and Esau, you know that every word God spoke to Rebekah about her babies was proven true, they could not have been more different.
“Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us.”
Ephesians 3:20 KJV
Reflection and Application
- How did Rebekah go from barren to doubly blessed? (list out all the ways/things that you can think of that played into it.)
- Think of ways God has blessed or doubly blessed you and/or someone else you know and why it happened.
The More We Know
- Rebekah did not have an easy pregnancy and Scripture tells us that she talked to the Lord about the difficulty (Genesis 25:22) ↩︎
- Notable matriarchs who wrestled with the stigma of barrenness include:
Sarah (Sarai): She endured years of childlessness before God miraculously enabled her to conceive Isaac in her old age (Genesis 11:30, Genesis 21:1-2).
Rachel: She famously cried to her husband Jacob, “Give me children, or I’ll die!” (Genesis 30:1).
Hannah: Mocked by her husband’s other wife due to her infertility, she poured out her anguish in prayer to God, eventually giving birth to the prophet Samuel (1 Samuel 1:6-8, 1 Samuel 1:20).
Elizabeth: In the New Testament, she was publicly disgraced for being childless, but gave birth to John the Baptist in her old age (Luke 1:7, Luke 1:24-25). ↩︎
Me From the Inside Out 