The Marriage of Isaac and Rebekah

24 Now Abraham was old, advanced in years, and the Lord had blessed Abraham in all things.^{(A) 2} Abraham said to his servant, the oldest of his house, who had charge of all that he had, “Put your hand under my thigh,^{(B) 3} and I will make you swear by the Lord, the God of heaven and earth, that you will not get a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, among whom I live,^{(C) 4} but will go to my country and to my kindred and get a wife for my son Isaac.”^{(D) 5} The servant said to him, “Perhaps the woman may not be willing to follow me to this land; must I then take your son back to the land from which you came?” ⁶ Abraham said to him, “See to it that you do not take my son back there. ⁷ The Lord, the God of heaven, who took me from my father’s house and from the land of my birth and who spoke to me and swore to me, ‘To your offspring I will give this land,’ he will send his angel before you, and you shall take a wife for my son from there.^{(E) 8} But if the woman is not willing to follow you, then you will be free from this oath of mine; only you must not take my son back there.” ⁹ So the servant put his hand under the thigh of Abraham his master and swore to him concerning this matter.^(F)

¹⁰ Then the servant took ten of his master’s camels and departed, taking all kinds of choice gifts from his master, and he set out and went to Aram-naharaim, to the city of Nahor.^{(G) 11} He made the camels kneel down outside the city by the well of water; it was toward evening, the time when women go out to draw water.^{(H) 12} And he said, “O Lord, God of my master Abraham, please grant me success today and show steadfast love to my master Abraham.^{(I) 13} I am standing here by the spring of water, and the daughters of the townspeople are coming out to draw water.^{(J) 14} Let the young woman to whom I shall say, ‘Please offer your jar that I may drink,’ and who shall say, ‘Drink, and I will water your camels’—let her be the one whom you have appointed for your servant Isaac. By this I shall know that you have shown steadfast love to my master.”^(K)

¹⁵ Before he had finished speaking, there was Rebekah, who was born to Bethuel son of Milcah, the wife of Nahor, Abraham’s brother, coming out with her water jar on her shoulder.^{(L) 16} The young woman was very fair to look upon, a virgin, whom no man had known. She went down to the spring, filled her jar, and came up.^{(M) 17} Then the servant ran to meet her and said, “Please let me sip a little water from your jar.” ¹⁸ “Drink, my lord,” she said and quickly lowered her jar upon her hand and gave him a drink.^{(N) 19} When she had finished giving him a drink, she said, “I will draw for your camels also, until they have finished drinking.”^{(O) 20} So she quickly emptied her jar into the trough and ran again to the well to draw, and she drew for all his camels. ²¹ The man gazed at her in silence to learn whether or not the Lord had made his journey successful.^(P)

²² When the camels had finished drinking, the man took a gold nose ring weighing a half shekel and two bracelets for her arms weighing ten gold shekels^{(Q) 23} and said, “Tell me whose daughter you are. Is there room in your father’s house for us to spend the night?” ²⁴ She said to him, “I am the daughter of Bethuel son of Milcah, whom she bore to Nahor.”^{(R) 25} She added, “We have plenty of straw and fodder and a place to spend the night.” ²⁶ The man bowed his head and worshiped the Lord^{(S) 27} and said, “Blessed be the Lord, the God of my master Abraham, who has not forsaken his steadfast love and his faithfulness toward my master. As for me, the Lord has led me on the way to the house of my master’s kin.”^(T)

³ Consider him who endured such hostility against himself from sinners,^[a] so that you may not grow weary in your souls or lose heart.^{(A) 4} In your struggle against sin you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood. ⁵ And you have forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as children—

⁷ Endure trials for the sake of discipline. God is treating you as children, for what child is there whom a parent does not discipline?^{(D) 8} If you do not have that discipline in which all children share, then you are illegitimate and not his children.^{(E) 9} Moreover, we had human parents to discipline us, and we respected them. Should we not be even more willing to be subject to the Father of spirits and live? ¹⁰ For they disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but he disciplines us for our good, in order that we may share his holiness.^{(F) 11} Now, discipline always seems painful rather than pleasant at the time, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.^(G)

The Unbelief of Jesus’s Brothers

7 After this Jesus went about in Galilee. He did not wish to go about in Judea because the Jews were looking for an opportunity to kill him.^{(A) 2} Now the Jewish Festival of Booths^[a] was near.^{(B) 3} So his brothers said to him, “Leave here and go to Judea so that your disciples also may see the works you are doing,^{(C) 4} for no one who wants^[b] to be widely known acts in secret. If you do these things, show yourself to the world.” ⁵ (For not even his brothers believed in him.)^{(D) 6} Jesus said to them, “My time has not yet come, but your time is always here.^{(E) 7} The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify against it that its works are evil.^{(F) 8} Go to the festival yourselves. I am not^[c] going to this festival, for my time has not yet fully come.” ⁹ After saying this, he remained in Galilee.

Jesus at the Festival of Booths

¹⁰ But after his brothers had gone to the festival, then he also went, not publicly but, as it were,^[d] in secret. ¹¹ The Jews were looking for him at the festival and saying, “Where is he?” ¹² And there was considerable complaining about him among the crowds. While some were saying, “He is a good man,” others were saying, “No, he is deceiving the crowd.”^{(G) 13} Yet no one would speak openly about him for fear of the Jews.^(H)