Dig Another Well (Rock Springs UMC)

This Bible story that I am about to read is, is one that I don't

think gets enough attention. It's one of my favorite stories

and, and I, I, I have to confess if if that I I first heard about

this story not from a careful study of the Scripture.

It goes. It's an easy story to miss when

you're just reading through the Bible, but I heard about this

story through a country and western song from the gentleman

by the name of Paul Overstreet, who was one of my favorite

musical artists. I'm not sure if he's written any

stuff recently or not, but if you're a fan of country from the

80s and 90s, you have you've heard a number of his songs that

either he performed or he wrote for others.

We'll get to that song in a minute because I think it's a

great interpretation of this passage, but I love this

passage. I, I think it is such a

wonderful one for Thanksgiving weekend, but also for any, any

week in any day of our lives. Let's jump into it here, Genesis

Genesis 6 · chapter mention

chapter 6. Going to just read verses 12

through 22 now and then we'll talk about some other verses a

little bit later here. Isaac planted crops in that

land, and the same year reaped A hundredfold because the Lord

blessed him. The man became rich, and his

wealth continued to grow until he became very wealthy.

He had so many flocks and herds and servants that the

Philistines envied him. So all the wells that his

father's servants had dug in the time of his father Abraham, the

Philistines stopped up, filling them with earth.

Then Abimelech said to Isaac, Move away from us.

You have become too powerful for us.

So Isaac moved away from there and encamped in the valley of

Girar, where he settled. Isaac reopened the wells that

had been dug in the time of his father Abraham, which the

Philistines had stopped up after Abraham had died, and he gave

them the same names that father had given them.

Isaac's servants dug in the valley and discovered a well of

fresh water there. But the herders of Girar

quarrelled with those of Isaac and said, This water is ours.

So he named the well Esic, because they disputed with him.

Then they dug another well, but they quarrelled over that one

also. So he named it Sitna.

He moved on from there and dug another well, and no one

quarrelled over it. He named it Rehaboth, saying,

Now the Lord has given us room, and we will flourish in the

land. May the Lord add His blessing to

the reading and the hearing of His word.

Dig another well. That I think is maybe the

simplest way to summarize these verses.

Dig another well. Isaac, there were a lot of

wells. Wells.

His father's had dug well. His father's servants had dug,

and they got filled up. And Isaac dug some more wells.

And then those wells were taken and Isaac dug some more well,

and he dug another well, and he dug another well.

So what does this have to do with Thanksgiving?

What does this have to do with with our lives here today?

This these water disputes that that Isaac had to go through

during his lifetime thousands of years ago?

Well, let's see this story in context, because the context

here is important to to, to see just how powerful Isaac's

actions were spiritually powerful in this setting.

So Isaac, let's remember Isaac's both of his parents have died

now Abraham and Sarah both have died.

Isaac is now the patriarch of the clan.

His entire household depends on him.

He's responsible for providing them with food, with shelter,

with water, with everything that they need to have a meaningful

good life. It's on Isaac's shoulders to

provide that. And yet Isaac, like his father,

is a stranger in a strange land. He's a foreigner.

He's an alien in this land that that has been promised to him

and to his descendants, but he's still just a visitor, a guest

depending upon the hospitality and the goodwill of others.

The only real estate his family owns is a small graveyard where

his mom and dad are buried. And that's it.

That's it. Everywhere else he lives, he's a

stranger, He's an alien, he's a foreigner.

He's the out of towner. He's the newcomer.

And to make matters worse, there's a famine in the land

now. Famines are bad now for farmers.

Everybody knows that Famines are bad now.

Famines were worse back then because, you know, tougher

pipes, no pipes. You know, irrigation.

Very, very difficult, very, very challenging.

Not even sure that they had irrigation in any meaningful way

in this part of the world at that time.

What's even worse is if you're in the midst of a famine and you

don't have a well, because if there's a famine, if there's

drought, if there's no food, that's, you know, no way to grow

them. If you don't have a well, all of

your crops are going to die. All of your animals are going to

die, and your family is in trouble, in danger of dying as

well. And here's Isaac, a stranger in

a strange land, a foreigner, an alien not owning a square foot

of real estate. And now his neighbors are

filling up his wells with dirt because they don't want him

there. And Isaac has to decide what is

he going to do? That's the context that we're

in. How do you respond in that kind

of situation when the very thing this is not, this is not a

message in internally for certain.

My brain keeps wanting to make this a message about wants

versus needs because but this is not about wants versus needs.

You need water to live. You need what if you're, if

you're, if your life, livelihood is, is agriculture, you have to

have water. It's not a want, it's an

absolute need. And he's a stranger in a strange

land. He doesn't own any land.

He doesn't own any water rights. And the wells that he has dug

and his father's dug, his enemies are now filling with

dirt or stealing from him. So what's he going to do?

What do we do when the thing that we need the most is being

taken away from us? Now, I am a public speaker.

I am a preacher. I am not a poet.

If you want short sermons, hire a poet to preach to you.

They can, they can compress ideas very succinctly.

Paul Overstreet, I think is a wonderful lyricist, a great

poet. And, and he's written a song, I

don't know, decades ago now that I'm going to play.

Now I put a made a cheesy little video to go behind it and put

the lyrics on the screen. So if that'll help you follow

the words, we're going to listen to it.

And, and he tells in 3 minutes what it's going to take me

another 20 minutes to finish saying.

So like I say, if you want short sermons, hire a poet.

I am not a poet, but let's listen to Paul Overstreet here.

Well I had a blessing from the Lord up above.

He gave him a beautiful woman to love, a place to live and some

land farm. 2 good legs and two good arms.

Well the devil came sneaking around one night decided he

would do a little evil do I figured he would hit a life

where it hurts. So we filled up all of ox whales

with dirt. Then I went out for his morning

drink. He got a dipper full of dirt and

his heart didn't sink, but he knew it was a devil.

So he said with a grin, God bless me once and he can do it

again. He bless me once and he can do

it again. So when the rays don't fall and

the crops all fail, and the cows ain't putting any milk in the

pail, don't sit around waiting for a check in the mail.

Just pick up the shovel and dig another well.

Pick up the shovel and dig another well.

Now me and old I got a lot in common.

Lord bless me with a beautiful woman.

He gave me a job, He gave me a home, He gave me a well to call

my own. When I go out for my morning

drink and get a dipper full of dirt.

And my heart does same, but I think of old.

I can, I have to grin because God bless me once and he can do

it again. He bless me once and he can do

it again. So when the rays don't fall and

the crops all fail, the cows ain't putting any milk in the

pail. Don't sit around waiting for a

check in the mail. Just pick up the show, dig

another well, pick up the shovel, dig another well.

Well, the good book says I finally won.

Pick up the shovel and dig another well.

The devil got tired and he left him alone.

Pick up the shovel and I know someday I'm going to win too.

Pick up the shovel. The good book tells me what to

do. Pick up the shovel and take

another well. Pick up the shovel and take

another well. Pick up the shovel and take

another well. Pick up the shovel.

I, I think that's as as good a sermon on, on that passage as

there is. So mine will be at best second

best to, to pullover streets here, probably a lot further

down the list than that. But what do you do in this

situation? Pick up the shovel and dig

another well, It's not as easy as it sounds sometimes, many

times, maybe most of the times. We're going to talk through this

a little bit more. And the first question I want to

ask is what is your well for Isaac?

His well was a literal well of water.

They needed water to survive. They were in a famine.

They needed water to survive. And his enemies were filling up

his wells with dirt or stealing his wells from them.

But what's your will? What's your will?

Is it a job? Is it a relationship?

Is it a talent OR an ability? A dream or a plan or something

else? What is it that you need to

survive? What is that thing or those

things where you think, you know what?

I can lose everything else, but I can't lose that.

I can have everything else taken away from me.

But don't take, don't take my job.

Don't don't take my dreams. Don't take this relationship.

Don't don't take my plans for the future.

Don't take this talent OR ability that or, or something

else. God, I need this.

I need this. Not a question of wants versus

needs here. There's not a question of you

know, you know, what do you really, really, really want?

But what do you need? What do you need?

What's your well, that if that's gone, you're saying myself, it's

over. There's nothing else I can do

here. I'm, I'm, I'm done, I'm done.

I need that. Whatever that is in your life,

what can you do if that well gets filled with dirt, if that

thing is taken away from you? We have a lot of options when

that happens, and Isaac had a lot of options when it happens.

One of the things we can do is just quit.

I'm done. Quit and run away.

I'm done. I'm out of here.

Isaac could have done that. The beginning of this passage,

God is telling Isaac, stay in the land.

There's a famine coming. Stay in the land.

Don't run away to Egypt. Egypt would have been the

natural place to go during a famine.

If there's a famine in that region, Egypt with the Nile

River Valley, there is ample water.

The flooding that happens there means that there's always going

to be good fertile soil and ample water.

Going to Egypt would have been the thing that made the most

sense. God said to Isaac, do not leave

during this famine. Isaac could have quit.

So God, this is great. It's very nice of you to say

that you're a spirit and and I'll worship you in spirit and

truth. But me and my family, my

animals, we need water to drink for my crops to grow.

We need water to to water them. I'm done with this.

I'm going to Egypt. Let me know when the famine's

over, then we'll come back. He could have quit.

He could have run away. He could play the blame game,

complaining and blaming. I my confession is this, this is

my favorite one. I love to complain.

I really, really, it's just it's it's one of my favorite pastimes

is complaining. I've been doing it since I was a

little and I'm good at it. So, and it's so easy to blame

other folks or other situations near or far.

It's those politicians, it's those you know, rich people,

it's those you know, those people are that it's always easy

to find someone to blame, complain and blame when things

go wrong. It's all their fault.

Woe is me, woe is me fight. This is another thing Isaac

could have fought. Abraham went to war at least

once when his nephew Lott and Lott's family were taken as

political prisoners. Abraham raised his own private

army, went to war, defeated an alliance of 5 kings, and brought

his people back. When Abimelech came to Isaac, he

said hey, you guys are too powerful of for us, go away, go

away. Isaac could have just said no,

make us. I'm going to fill up my wells

with dirt, I'll come and kill your people.

He could have gone to war with Abimelech, with the other

Philistines in the area, to claim his rights for that land

and for that water. He could have said enough of

this waiting. We're taking it now.

This is ours and we will fight for it.

We will fight for it. We can fight.

Isaac didn't do any of those things.

He didn't quit, didn't run away, didn't complain or blame, and he

didn't fight. What did Isaac do?

He dug another well. He dug another well.

What an extraordinary act of faith it was for Isaac to do

that. And I want to be careful here

because any good thing in Scripture can get twisted.

And, and one of the ways to twist this business of digging

another well is to turn this into some sort of bootstrap

theology that that Isaac saved himself.

He just went out and he dug another well.

He pulled himself up by his own bootstraps.

He did what he needed to do. He took care of business all by

himself. Or, or another way to get this

twisted up is, is to see it as sort of a suck it up and walk it

off kind of theology. I know life's hard.

Just grin and bear it. You got to work through the

pain. Suck it up, walk it off and move

on with life. It's not that either.

This is an extraordinary act of faith, and in one sense it's an

extraordinary act of generosity. After Abraham died and Isaac

became the patriarch, and God said there's a famine coming,

but don't go to Egypt. Stay right here in this land,

and I will provide for you. And he renewed his promise.

Your descendants will become a great nation.

All nations of the world will be blessed through you.

All of this land will one day belong to your descendants.

Stay here. Stay here.

And Isaac reopens his father's wells, digs new wells of his

own. They get filled up or stolen

from him. And Isaac's response is, you

know what? There's plenty of water here.

God has promised to take care of me and my family.

There's a famine going on. You all keep that well.

I'll go dig another one. I'll go dig another one.

God will take care of me. God will take care of my.

God has promised to provide everything we need.

God made Isaac wealthy during a fan.

He was a farmer and there was a famine going on and God blessed

him and made him so wealthy that the locals became envious of him

and he didn't own an acre of real estate.

And Isaac's there's plenty. Let him keep the water.

Let him keep that well. We'll, we'll, we'll go dig

another one. It'll all be good.

God's got us covered. A tremendous act of faith, a

tremendous act of generosity to say to his enemies, you can keep

that. We'll, we'll, we'll be all

right. God's got us.

God's got our back. That's the attitude.

It's not pulling himself up by his bootstraps.

He's not grinning and bearing it.

He's not working through the pain.

He's just trusting that God will do what God said he was going to

do. And so we dug another.

Well, I think one of the ways that we can do that is and to

live with that same kind of faith that Isaac had is, is to

make the interpretive leap that Paul Overstreet made.

Now, I'd already confessed once that I first heard this story

through listening to the song. And then I, I thought, and I

heard I was like, that sounds like I bet that's Isaac.

I wonder if that's your because I've been with, I'd heard a lot

of Paul Overstreet before. I was like, I wonder if he's if

he's gotten that from the Bible. So I went and I found the story

in the Bible and I read through it.

It's like, well, that sounds right.

But there's no devil in this story.

You know, the song says the devil did all of this.

The Bible says the Philistines did all of this.

And one simplistic twist would be to say, well, it's, you know,

the Philistines are the devil. The Philistines are the devil.

Let's think about what Paul said.

Anytime we're in a conflict, anytime people are coming at us,

Paul said. Remember this, our battle is not

against flesh and blood. It's against the principalities

and powers that are ever present in this Dark World.

Our enemy is a spiritual enemy, not flesh and blood.

And Isaac was able to look at the Philistines, these flesh and

blood folks facing famine and potential starvation themselves,

and see them not as an enemy, even though they were stealing

what he needed to live and what his family needed to live.

They were stealing it, but he was able to see them not as an

enemy. But it's a group of people in

need of God's blessing. And so we let them have the

wells. He let him have the wells.

So where's the devil in this story?

The devil is there. We can see it, his presence in

one little word. He, that is Isaac, had so many

flocks and herds and servants that the Philistines envied him.

So all the wells that his father's servant to Doug in the

time of his father Abraham, the Philistines stopped up, filling

them with dirt. The devil was in the envy.

Envy is one of the most pernicious spiritual forces out

there. It's a spiritual cancer.

It's so tempting to look up the ladder and see the folks that

have more. More of what?

Whatever it is more. More fame, more top money, more

talent, more opportunity, more, more education, more land, more

what? More this, more that, whatever.

They've got more. And it's not fair.

That ought to be mine. I should have that.

Why should they have that much and I have so little?

Why it's not? I want it.

I'm entitled to it. In fact, I think I'll just take

it. Envy is such a pernicious thing.

Envy. Envy is death to gratitude.

It is impossible to be both envious and grateful at the same

time. You can't hold both of those

things spiritually at the same time.

The flip side of that is gratitude is the death of envy

when we can be Isaac. Isaac, he could have joined in

the envy. It's not fair.

These Philistines, these dirty, rotten folks that don't even

follow the one true God. It's not fair.

They've got all of this land and we don't have any land.

All we want, we've already moved as far away from them as we can

get. All we want is enough water to

feed the crop, you know, to water the crops and feed the and

water our animals and water ourselves.

And they keep coming and taking that too.

God's promised this land is ours.

It's not fair that they have it. It's not right that they have

it. We'll take it, We'll fight.

We'll fight. He could have played the envy

game and instead of being a blessing to his neighbors, have

brought death and destruction upon his neighbors.

Because that's what envy does. Envy tears communities apart.

It tears relationships apart. It tears people apart.

It tears us apart from the inside out and wrecks

relationships and hope and joy and opportunity.

When we're envious, we cannot be grateful.

But when we're grateful and we're grateful, we cannot be

envious. Isaac chose gratitude.

God has blessed me. God has made me wealthy.

God has provided for the needs of my family.

We're going to be grateful for that and just dig another well.

We can dig another well. We can do that.

Yeah. One way.

Say, well, you know, we, we can, we can trust that the God who

brought us water, this thing that we needed in this place

will give us that same thing in another place.

Because what's God going to do? God has promised this all is

that this is all going to be ours, that, that I mean, my

descendants are going to be a great nation.

Is God really going to let us die of thirst here?

He told us to stay here. God's not going to abandon us

now. God's going to take care of us.

He dug another well. He dug another well.

In the end, Isaac understood what we can understand that the

devil's attacks always bow to God's sovereignty.

When the devil whispers envy in someone else's ear and they come

at us or jealousy and they come at us or or hatred or or greed

or lust, whatever it is, and they're, they're coming at us

because because the demons got and I'm not.

You got to understand, I believe in the devil.

I believe in demons. I believe all of those things

are real. I'm not also not convinced

there's a devil hiding behind every Bush, but I am convinced

that our battle is not against people.

Then when people are coming at us and attacking us because we

are faithfully following God, and if we're faithfully

following God, we will be attacked.

That you know, happen to Jesus, happen to Paul, happen to Peter,

you know it's going to happen to us.

When we're faithfully following God, we'll be attacked that the

people aren't our enemies, that the devil is stirring them up.

And we can remember that. And we can also remember that

the devil has already been defeated and that the devil's

attacks always have to bow to God's sovereignty.

The devil was trying to drive Isaac out of the promised land,

to rob Isaac of the blessing that God had promised him to get

Isaac to quit, to get Isaac to leave, to get Isaac to choose to

be a curse rather than a blessing to his neighbors.

The devil was driving it all of that.

And Isaac said, no, God has promised.

God has promised. I do not need to fear the

attacks of the devil because God has promised.

And for us, we know even more than Isaac knew because we not

only have Abraham's story and Isaac's story, but all of the

other stories, including Jesus story, that even if they kill

us, that still can't for God's sovereignty, God will just give

us our life back. The devil's plans, the devil's

attacks always have to bow to God's sovereignty.

God promised Isaac at the beginning of the chapter, right

after Abraham has died. God promised Isaac, I'm going to

bless you in the same way I blessed Abraham.

He was faithful to me, did everything I commanded him to

do. He was faithful to me and I

blessed him. I'm going to bless you the same

way your descendants will be a great nation.

All the nations of the world will be blessed through you.

Isaac did all of these things. He was there.

He needed the water. The wells were filled up with

dirt. He dug new wells.

They got filled up with dirt. He dug new wells.

They got stolen, and he dug new wells.

They got stolen and he dug new wells.

And at the end of all of that, God came back to him and

reminded him of the promise. He reminded of them a promise.

That night, that very night, after Isaac had dug that well

over which there was no quarreling, God came to him and

said, I am the God of your father, Abraham.

Do not be afraid, for I am with you.

I will bless you and will increase the number of your

descendants for the sake of my servant, Abraham.

He reminded, this is it. You're getting it, Isaac.

This is it. You don't have to be afraid of

the Philistines. You don't have to be afraid of

dying of starvation. You don't have to be afraid of

dying of thirst. I have you.

I've got you covered. I will come fill my I will

fulfill my promises. God's sovereignty always wins

over the devil's attacks. And what did Isaac do?

The final act. I love the way I love the way

the story closes. Isaac built an altar.

Isaac worshiped in response to God's faithfulness.

Isaac worshiped God, He gave thanks to God, He gave honor to

God, he gave glory to God. He bowed him down, mild himself

down, and resubmitted himself to God.

I am yours, God. I will follow you.

I will be faithful to you. And then he dug another well.

I think you probably can't have too many wells sometimes.

I don't know. Isaac built an altar there, and

he called on the name of the Lord, and there he pitched his

tent. And there his servants dug a

well. They dug a well.

There's work for us to do. The water didn't fall from the

sky. There wasn't a great miracle

that was clearly miraculous in the sense of, you know, water

from Iraq. Like when the Israelites were in

the wilderness following Moses, there was work they had to do.

They had to dig. They dug another well.

And God provided. God provided Isaac worshipped

Isaac worshipped the Lord and he dug another well in in in our

time. One of the folks that that this

brings to my mind is is gentleman by the name of Dave

Durvecki. Anyone remember that name?

Remember Dave Durvecki, Rick, baseball player back in the 80s,

nineties, somewhere in there? Yeah, Yeah, he was pitcher.

Started with the Padres, I believe, and then later moved to

the Giants. I might be flipping that, but I

think he started with the Padres and later moved to the Giants.

Good pitcher, not the best of all time, but a good pitcher.

Pitched a lot of innings, had a lot of success, made it to the

All Star game one year. Very, very good pitcher.

And then at one point late in his career, he got cancer in his

throwing arm and the doctors told him we got it.

It's going to take surgery to get that out.

You will, based on what we have to remove and where that tumor

is, you will almost certainly never pitch again, certainly not

at Major League level. And Dave said, I'm not having

any of that. He went through the surgery,

went through rehab, he trained and he came back.

He came back, you know, he dug another well.

That well got filled. He dug.

He dug another well. I'm coming back.

You're saying I can't, you know, this, this cancer is taken away.

Took him out. I can.

I don't remember how long he was out.

It was at least one year, maybe maybe 2 before he got back.

But he came back and in his first game back, this is almost

unheard of these days. He pitched 8 innings, gave up

one run and got the win. And his second game back he was

in the 6th inning and he rare bags of lefty, he reared back to

throw a pitch and that torque on his arm and his arm snapped

right there in the game. Right there on national

television if you can probably I haven't.

I remember seeing, I didn't, I wasn't watching the game, but I

remember seeing the replays on the news and his arm snapped and

the doctor said it's back and it's worse and they had to take

off his whole arm. Dave could have quit.

He could have run away. He could have blamed and

complained. He could have fought, got angry

and mad and vicious toward the people around him.

But he didn't do any of those things.

He dug another well and he shared his experience and his

faith. He was deeply, I think, I'm not

sure if he's still alive or not, but he was a man of deep faith

and he used his experience to share faith and hope with

others. He dug another well.

I want to read to you a couple of things.

He said he's he's written a few books, but these are just some

excerpts, short excerpts from some interviews he did.

Trebeki said this I used and this was after his arm was

taken. I used to depend on myself.

Now I depend more on more on God.

Through my own suffering I have become more aware of His and I

love him more as a result. I realized my life wasn't in my

hands anymore. My life was in God's hands.

It was in His hands all along. Our life is in God's hands and

when our well is filled up, when what we need is taken away from

us, we can complain, we can fight, we can blame, we can

quit, we can run away, or we can do what Isaac did.

We can do what Dave did. We can dig another well, we can

worship God and dig another well.

In Jesus name. Amen.

Amen.