A Bride Brought Home from Far Away

(Genesis 24)

Abraham was very old now. His hair was white, and his hands shook a little, and his heart was full of one last wish.

He wanted a wife for his son Isaac. The same Isaac who had once carried the firewood up the mountain, the boy the ram had died for.

Abraham longed for a bride from his own faraway family, from the old home he had left behind so long ago, not a girl from the land nearby, where nobody knew the God who had made promises to him in the dark.

But Abraham was too old for such a journey. And Isaac could not go himself.

So Abraham called his most trusted servant, the one who had walked beside him for years and years.

"Go," said Abraham. "Travel far away. And bring back a bride for my son."

The servant had never met her. He didn't even know her name. He only knew the son he was bringing her home to, and how dearly that son was loved.

So he loaded ten camels with beautiful things, gifts for a girl he had not yet found, and he set off across the wide and dusty world.

When he came at last to the faraway country, he stopped beside a well, and he bowed his head and asked God to show him the right one.

He had barely finished praying when Rebekah came walking down to the water.

She was kind. She gave him a drink. Then she drew water for all his thirsty camels too, jar after jar after jar, until her arms must have ached. The servant watched her, and his heart grew warm. There she is, he thought. The one.

He brought out the gifts, gold for her hands, and he told her family the story from the beginning: the old father, the beloved son, the long, long journey just to find her.

Then they turned to Rebekah and asked her the biggest question of her whole life.

"Will you go with this man?"

She had never seen Isaac. She had never seen the home. She had only a servant's promise, and a sudden ache in her heart for a place she had never been.

And she said, "I will go."

So Rebekah climbed up onto a camel and rode toward a home she had never seen, to a husband she had never met, who was waiting for her, watching the road, longing for the day she would come.

Isaac had gone out walking in the evening field, and he lifted up his eyes, and there she was, far away at first, then closer, then close enough to see his face. He brought her home, and he loved her, and she was never a stranger again.

Have you ever felt that ache, the longing to belong somewhere you have never even been?

There is a Father. And there is a beloved Son. Even now the Son is gathering a Bride from every faraway place, every well, every dusty road. He has sent his own gentle Spirit, like that faithful servant, to find you and to whisper, "Come. He is waiting. He has loved you all this time."

The road is long, and you cannot see the end of it yet. But one evening the beloved Son will lift up his eyes, the way Isaac did, and see you coming up the road. And he will bring you in, and you will be home.