8 ¶
Therefore Abimelech rose early in the morning, and called all his
servants, and told all these things in their ears: and the men were sore afraid.
9 Then Abimelech called Abraham, and
said unto him, What hast thou done unto us? and what have I offended thee, that
thou hast brought on me and on my kingdom a great sin? thou hast done deeds
unto me that ought not to be done. 10
And Abimelech said unto Abraham, What sawest thou, that thou hast done
this thing? 11 And Abraham said, Because
I thought, Surely the fear of God is not in this place; and they will slay me
for my wife’s sake. 12 And yet indeed
she is my sister; she is the daughter of my father, but not the daughter of my
mother; and she became my wife. 13 And
it came to pass, when God caused me to wander from my father’s house, that I
said unto her, This is thy kindness which thou shalt shew unto me; at every
place whither we shall come, say of me, He is my brother.
This Philistine king does not delay early in the
morning to calling his servants together and telling them how God spoke to him
in this dream. Apparently, the righteousness of this individual king is
reflected in the culture of his household.
Proverbs
1:7 The fear of the LORD is the
beginning of knowledge: but fools despise wisdom and instruction.
Understand God’s involvement in and control of every
moment of your life and realize how badly you need to pray for His mercy and
how happy you should be that He loves you.
Abimelech blames Abraham for deceiving him and
bringing the possibility of great sin upon his household. He insists he has
done nothing to deserve this treatment and wants to know why Abraham did it,
what he saw in Abimelech that suggested this sinful deception was necessary.
Abraham admits that he assumed that Abimelech was a godless reprobate who did
not fear God. So, we can assume that this was the normal state of kings and
kingdoms as Abraham knew. He had every reason to believe that Abimelech, as we
have understood the customs of the time, would kill him and take his wife. It
must have been a common concern of men.
Abraham then sort of halfway justified himself. “Well,
what I said really wasn’t a lie. She is also my step-sister.” This scene makes
a mockery of the times when we justify a lie, dissembling, insisting that since
it was partly true it wasn’t really a lie. Oh, how many times I have heard that
argument from a child, a teenager, or a grown person. The intent was deception
but when found out we think we are so clever in that part of it was really
true.
Finally, he says that this was what he told her to do
everywhere they went where there was some danger. But, we see that Abraham’s
lack of trust in God’s protection was unwarranted because even though he tried
to deceive Abimelech for his own safety’s sake God revealed Himself to the king
and warned him. In the two situations we see that Pharaoh, though wicked, was
wise enough to know that, with the sicknesses brought on his house, he wanted
to be rid of Abram and Sarai and even blessed them with abundance. But here,
God, knowing Abimelech’s heart, revealed Himself, but protected Abraham.
Abimelech is a model of a righteous Gentile king.
2Samuel
23:3 The God of Israel said, the Rock of
Israel spake to me, He that ruleth over men must be just, ruling in the fear of
God.
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