Our culture is always on the move.
And a lot of this “moving” is away from pain. When a job becomes difficult, people often switch to a new one. If a marriage gets tough, some walk away. If your local church changes a little too much for your taste, we move on to something “better.” We’ll chase the next opportunity to escape hardship.
But what if the Lord’s blessings for us are not in the easy places, but the hard ones? What if we see a way to leave the easy place, yet we feel the Lord is calling us to stay where we are?
This is the situation we find in Genesis 26. Isaac is in a tough place, but there’s an easy place just waiting for him to saddle up and move.
But the Lord had different plans that we see in Genesis 26:1-11.
1 Now there was a famine in the land—besides the previous famine in Abraham’s time—and Isaac went to Abimelek king of the Philistines in Gerar. 2 The Lord appeared to Isaac and said, “Do not go down to Egypt; live in the land where I tell you to live. 3 Stay in this land for a while, and I will be with you and will bless you. For to you and your descendants I will give all these lands and will confirm the oath I swore to your father Abraham. 4 I will make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and will give them all these lands, and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, 5 because Abraham obeyed me and did everything I required of him, keeping my commands, my decrees and my instructions.” 6 So Isaac stayed in Gerar.
Genesis 26:1-11, New International Version
7 When the men of that place asked him about his wife, he said, “She is my sister,” because he was afraid to say, “She is my wife.” He thought, “The men of this place might kill me on account of Rebekah, because she is beautiful.”
8 When Isaac had been there a long time, Abimelek king of the Philistines looked down from a window and saw Isaac caressing his wife Rebekah. 9 So Abimelek summoned Isaac and said, “She is really your wife! Why did you say, ‘She is my sister’?”
Isaac answered him, “Because I thought I might lose my life on account of her.”
10 Then Abimelek said, “What is this you have done to us? One of the men might well have slept with your wife, and you would have brought guilt upon us.”
11 So Abimelek gave orders to all the people: “Anyone who harms this man or his wife shall surely be put to death.”
It must have been a hard message to hear. The Lord said, “Do not go down to Egypt. Live in the land where I tell you to live. Stay in this land for a while, and I will be with you and will bless you” (Genesis 26:2–3).
Isaac obeyed. He stayed. But make no mistake: it wasn’t easy. Let me say it again: Isaac’s obedience to the Lord was not easy. Isaac faced fear, stress, and the temptation to compromise. Isaac had to push aside his own instincts to trust the Lord and stay in the land of famine.
But the Lord blessed him because he trusted the Lord more than his own instincts.
If you’ve ever planted a garden, then you know this principle. If you keep uprooting a plant whenever the soil is dry or overly wet, it will never grow roots deep enough to survive. Constantly moving a plant in and out of soil throws it into shock. Growth doesn’t happen in chaos; it takes stability. Even when the conditions are harsh.
And Isaac was in harsh conditions. He even contributed to its harshness by committing the same sin as his father. Like Abraham, Isaac called his wife his sister to spare his neck. Even the pagans knew it was sinful to touch another man’s wife. The Lord protected Isaac from his own stupidity. Abimelek should’ve killed Isaac for lying to him, but Isaac was spared.
Isaac sinned when fear led him to lie about Rebekah. Fear can do that. Fear isn’t when we take our eyes off the Lord and see the famine. Fear tempts us to compromise, but faith keeps our eyes on Jesus.
It’s actually comforting to know that our Lord has factored our stupidity and sinfulness into His plan. The Lord often calls us to stay where He has planted us. This allows our roots to grow deep enough to witness His blessing. We must remain faithful through that process.
The Lord may or may not be calling you to stay in a particular geographic location. But He may be calling you to stay in a marriage, a church, or a community. He might also be calling you to remain in a difficult season of life. He might be calling you through the famine.
The easy way out often looks like “Egypt,” but the blessings of God are found where His presence is. If you trust Jesus enough to stay in the famine, you might just discover that the ground you thought was barren is not. It may become the soil of His most powerful work in your life.
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