Fourth Sunday after Pentecost, Proper 9, July 6, 2014

Genesis 24:34-38, 42-49, 58-67  

Laban said, “I am Abraham’s servant. The Lord has greatly blessed my master, and he has become wealthy; he has given him flocks and herds, silver and gold, male and female slaves, camels and donkeys.  And Sarah my master’s wife bore a son to my master when she was old; and he has given him all that he has. My master made me swear, saying, ‘You shall not take a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, in whose land I live; but you shall go to my father’s house, to my kindred, and get a wife for my son.’

“I came today to the spring, and said, ‘O Lord, the God of my master Abraham, if now you will only make successful the way I am going!  I am standing here by the spring of water; let the young woman who comes out to draw, to whom I shall say, “Please give me a little water from your jar to drink,” and who will say to me, “Drink, and I will draw for your camels also”—let her be the woman whom the Lord has appointed for my master’s son.’

“Before I had finished speaking in my heart, there was Rebekah coming out with her water jar on her shoulder; and she went down to the spring, and drew. I said to her, ‘Please let me drink.’ She quickly let down her jar from her shoulder, and said, ‘Drink, and I will also water your camels.’ So I drank, and she also watered the camels. Then I asked her, ‘Whose daughter are you?’ She said, ‘The daughter of Bethuel, Nahor’s son, whom Milcah bore to him.’ So I put the ring on her nose, and the bracelets on her arms. Then I bowed my head and worshiped the Lord, and blessed the Lord, the God of my master Abraham, who had led me by the right way to obtain the daughter of my master’s kinsman for his son. Now then, if you will deal loyally and truly with my master, tell me; and if not, tell me, so that I may turn either to the right hand or to the left.”

And they called Rebekah, and said to her, “Will you go with this man?” She said, “I will.” So they sent away their sister Rebekah and her nurse along with Abraham’s servant and his men. And they blessed Rebekah and said to her,

“May you, our sister, become
    thousands of myriads;
may your offspring gain possession
    of the gates of their foes.”

Then Rebekah and her maids rose up, mounted the camels, and followed the man; thus the servant took Rebekah, and went his way.

Now Isaac had come from Beer-lahai-roi, and was settled in the Negeb. Isaac went out in the evening to walk in the field; and looking up, he saw camels coming. And Rebekah looked up, and when she saw Isaac, she slipped quickly from the camel, and said to the servant, “Who is the man over there, walking in the field to meet us?” The servant said, “It is my master.” So she took her veil and covered herself. And the servant told Isaac all the things that he had done. Then Isaac brought her into his mother Sarah’s tent. He took Rebekah, and she became his wife; and he loved her. So Isaac was comforted after his mother’s death.

Reflections: Evidently, Abraham doesn’t fully approve of the Canaanite women. As you probably remember, Abraham sends his servant back to his old stomping grounds to find a woman from his own people for his son Isaac to marry. What I find interesting today is the way Laban decides he will identify the right woman.

Like so many biblical figures, Laban asks for a sign from God. In Judges 6, for example, Gideon lays out a fleece to catch the dew (alternatively, to not catch the dew) as a signal of God’s intent. Gideon’s test involved what we might call a “miraculous” violation of natural processes. In the first test, dew was to fall only on the fleece; in the second test, it was to fall every except the fleece. And God complied, making it easy for Gideon to discern the divine will.

But in real life—by which I mean our lives—discernment is not so easy. Our lives are fraught with ambiguity; reality just doesn’t fit into our little boxes, or comply with on/off switches. As a consequence, I am not a little troubled by  passages such as this one. Yet I do pray for guidance. But surely there is a significant difference between seeking to be open to the movement of the Spirit, on the one hand, and “putting the Lord God to the test,” on the other.

I can see understand Laban’s prayer for guidance in very different ways. We can interpret it as making a deal, like planning some sort secret handshake by which God will reveal the answer. Maybe that is exactly what is happening in the text, and maybe the story was passed down to us by people who do make decisions that way.

But a “secret handshake” may not be the only way to read the story. Indeed, why should Laban have to work out an elaborate scenario if he wants to fulfill God’s will? Couldn’t God make it easier by speaking out from heaven or, say, carving the woman’s name on a stone tablet?

What if when Laban details the scenario of the woman at the well, he isn’t actually arranging a sign with God, but simply thinking out loud? I notice that the scene reveals not a particular (say a short, cross-eyed woman called Gigi), but a person with a generous heart. Could the scene Laban conjures up be less a set of stage directions for God to follow than an example of the behavior of the kind of woman he’s looking for?  And if that’s possible, then perhaps her generous character more than anything else, is what made her the right person for his master.

We do often yearn for easy-to-interpret “signs,” quick answers with little involvement on our part. But perhaps discernment is really about the cultivation of insight and illumination, perhaps it involves our whole being and the whole of our lives.