January 14, 2002
"IN THE WAY"

Abraham had been given God's covenant promises and, in a miraculous way, had been provided with a son Isaac, through whose descendants these promises would be fulfilled. The only trouble was that Isaac could not bring forth these descendants without a wife. Abraham believed that the wife of his son of promise must be a very special woman, chosen by God. He knew that she could not come from among the Canaanites in the midst of whom his family now lived. She must be of his own people, the Semitic stock who inhabited his home city of Ur. So Abraham sent a trusted servant to find the woman of God's choice.

Genesis 24 records considerable discussion of how the servant found the woman God had in mind and knew her when he met her. He went to a public place near Ur, where people (particularly women) came out to draw water from the well. He made an arrangement with God, identifying signals that would give him a clear indication. When he finally encountered Rebekah, there was a delightful little conversation between the two, implying that both of them recognized God's hand in the encounter. At one point the servant said this:
      I being in the way, the Lord led me to the house of my master's rethren."

I remember a sermon based on this passage I heard during my teen years. It really stuck with me because the Elizabethan era wording of the King James translation seemed so quaint to my ears:
   I being in the way, the Lord led me . . . ."
The preacher pointed out that the Lord led this man because he was "in the way," on the road, going to where his common sense told him the answer to his prayer was likely to be. He suggested that God usually leads us while we're moving in the direction we think is right. If the servant had remained in Canaan and fasted and prayed for guidance, he would never be in the place where God could bring him into contact with Rebekah. Similarly, the preacher exhorted us, if we want the Lord to guide us, we should get moving in a likely direction and let him steer us from there, rather than passively sitting around waiting for some sort of lightning bolt. This made sense to me, and I have always tried to follow his advice.

Since then I've kind of put that passage on a shelf in my mind and forgotten it. Modern versions translate it in a way that would not give my old preacher friend much comfort. They don't seem to buy his interpretation of the phrase "in the way." But I've recently taken it from the shelf and dusted it off. I've checked the Hebrew, and I think the King James Version and the preacher's application of it are quite likely to be right.

If you read the verse in a King James Bible, you'll see that the word "being" is in italics, which means that the word is not actually in the original language, but has been supplied by the translators to clarify the meaning. It seems to me, if you leave the word "being" out, you have an even more pithy statement:
   "I, in the way, the Lord led me."
That's the way Hebrew is—words are boldly laid side by side without a detailed explanation of how they relate. You're supposed to know intuitively.

I got to thinking of another familiar way we use the phrase "in the way" in English idiom. If something is "in the way," it's blocking the path, it's impeding progress.

So here's the second sermon from this passage. "I" can be "in the way" in two senses, one good, one bad. If I'm "in the way" meaning on the road, taking positive steps towards God's will, I'm cooperating with God and am in harmony with his will. This creates an ideal situation in which God can lead me and I can understand his leading. But if I'm "in the way" as a fallen tree across the road is in the way, I'm an obstacle to God's will. I'm like the stubborn mule fighting the Master's efforts to lead him to water. Then I make it very hard for God to guide me in my life.

You want to know God's will for your life? Ask yourself, "Am I ‘in the way' or ‘in the way'?" Am I making it easier for him to guide me or harder?

–Pastor George Van Alstine